Numerical study on the thermal and electrical performance of a novel MCHP PV-Trombe wall system

Most of existing photovoltaic (PV)-Trombe wall systems use a single coolant which has the drawbacks of low utilization efficiency and unreasonable heat distribution of space heating. In order to address these problems, a novel micro-channel heat pipe PV-Trombe wall system is proposed in this paper. The system uses heat pipe and Trombe wall to cool the PV collector decreasing its operating temperature and thus improving the overall efficiency. Moreover, an air-cooled condenser is used to control the thermal energy transfer in the room to improve the thermal comfort. The mathematical model of the system under different operation modes is verified to investigate the performance of the system in Lhasa, Beijing and Nanjing. The results show that: (i) during the space heating mode, the average room temperature of 20.36 degrees C, 19.80 degrees C and 20.18 degrees C can be reached while the daily total power generation of 0.86 kWh, 0.81 kWh, 0.72 kWh can be achieved in Lhasa, Beijing and Nanjing, respectively; (ii) during the hot water mode, the water temperature in the tanks increases only by 8.08 degrees C-12.76 degrees C and the total power generation is around 0.20 kWh-0.23 kWh in the three cities while the indoor temperature increases by less than 0.1 degrees C due to the lowest facade solar radiation in summer.