Water and heat-sink cooling system for increasing the solar cell performances

Solar panel comprises some solar cells in series and parallel arrangements converting sunlight into electrical current in usable level. However, the cell arrangement causes large surface area exposed to sunlight that tends to be heat absorbent. Existing study shows that the efficiency of solar cell decreases about 0.5% for each 1C-surface temperature increment. Various cooling systems for solar cells have been offered by many researchers. This paper proposes a passive cooling system that combines water-filled aluminium blocks and heat-sinks. The water-filled aluminium blocks absorb heat from the back of solar cells and the heat-sinks release this heat to the air. The experimental assessment showed that the proposed method is able to reduce surface temperatures about 11.91 % lower than the non-cooled solar panel. Compared to the existing methods, the proposed coolant achieved 5.08% and 7.37% lower surface temperatures than water and heat-sink coolant subsequently. The proposed cooling system also exerted at least 6.28% higher power than the other methods. © 2019 S. Suherman et al.