An experimental study on solar energy utilization of an ETFE cushion integrated photovoltaic/thermal system

摘要

Cushions integrated photovoltaic/thermal system(CIPV/T)is presented in this paper to expand the application of buildings integrated photovoltaic/thermal system(BIPV/T)to inflated membrane structures.A mockup mainly composed of a three-layer ethylene-tetra-fluoro-ethylene(ETFE)cushion and two amorphous silicon photovoltaic panels(PVs)was designed and constructed.Then,fifteen times onsite tests were carried out on sunny and cloudy days in two years.In this paper,four typical tests were selected to evaluate the solar energy utilization of this novel system.Solar energy utilization could be evaluated by net power and temperature differences(ΔT),representing the power and thermal energy,respectively.The net power was more than 20 Wh,suggesting that this CIPV/T could be a power independent system.Meanwhile,the ΔT between inside and outside of the cushion was 16.8-31.2 ℃ and the temperature inside the cushion was 25.7-62.4℃,showing an attractive potential in collecting thermal energy even in winter.Moreover,the characteristics of temperature distribution of the cushion were also obtained,which should be taken into consideration when analyzing the structural behavior of this cushion in detail.This study has revealed the technical feasibility of the cushion integrated photovoltaic/thermal system on solar energy utilization.It provides a novel BIPV/T for inflated membrane structures.