Application of PV Panels in Large Multi-Story Buildings Feasibility Study Sara Kayal The awareness of global warming along with an ever increasing demand for a new source of energy has brought a strong interest in harnessing natural resources such as solar energy. This thesis evaluates the viability of applying photovoltaic (PV) panels in high-rise commercial buildings of around 20 stories. Specifically, the thesis is intended to provide a pre-planning tool during the early design stage for architects and designers who are considering the deployment of PV panels in new multi-story construction. The first three chapters cover a comprehensive literature review and describe several case studies of the application of PV panels in multi-story buildings. The first chapter serves as an introduction to the objectives and rationale of PV panel research. Chapter 2 explains the physics and characteristics of PV panel technology that is applicable to multi-story buildings. Various PV panel types are explored in this chapter and it is suggested that window-based PV panels are the most suitable type for multi-story buildings in which the available roof area is small in area and limited in flexibility due to competition with other uses. Chapter 3 investigates factors that influence the efficiency of PV panels. These factors reduce the efficiency of PV panels to about 10-15%. In Chapter 4 a study model is presented to validate the results of the previous chapters and to determine the feasibility of PV panel systems with the aid of computer model analysis and simulation. The study model includes a base case of a 20-story building that is surrounded by four adjacent buildings, one adjacent to each orientation. Five configurations of the base model with different arrangements of PV panels were analyzed. First, electrical energy of the base case was calculated without applying any PV panels. The second and third configurations include PV panels on all of the available façade areas on a typical summer and winter day, respectively. The fourth and fifth configurations feature PV panels on only the top 10 floors. The simulation results show that although some savings accrue over a 25-year life-cycle period, these savings pale in comparison with the initial capital cost associated with the purchase and installation of the PV panels. It was also found that although crystalline silicon panels have a higher initial cost, their superior efficiency and performance present them as better candidates for PV panel applications. In addition, as expected, the south orientation provides potentially the largest amount of electricity production. In Chapter 5 the simulation results are summarized. The simulation studies address the application of PV panels from three different perspectives, namely: economics; technical feasibility; and, subjective factors. The first four chapters confirm that PV panels, at the current level of technology, are not an efficient and cost effective solution for multi-story buildings. They can satisfy only a very small portion of the electrical energy demand of the building at a very high initial capital cost. However, some strategies are suggested for mitigating the dual problems of inadequate PV production volume and high initial costs. Subjective factors account for other benefits that are not related to economic considerations. These factors include educational, promotional, and business line promotion benefits that could accrue to the building owner.

Currently 10% of all single family homes produced in the U.S. are manufactured homes with 75% of these households making less than $50,000 in annual income (Manufactured Housing Survey). Manufactured homes typically use twice as much primary energy per square foot than site built homes yet there is no agenda within the industry or its governing bodies to address this excess energy consumption. The research presented in this thesis compares the thermal envelope performance of the typical wood stud framing used in the manufactured home industry to the thermal envelope of structural insulated panels (SIPs). This comparison examines the energy savings a SIP manufactured home could create for a home owner while speculating on the financial and technical feasibility of using SIPs in the manufactured housing industry. Ultimately, the comparison reveals the short comings of the Manufactured Homes Construction and Safety Standards (HUD Code) regarding thermal envelope requirements and energy use intensity. These short comings are revealed when the energy use of HUD compliant manufactured homes is scrutinized and compared to the energy use of a similar home built with SIPs for the thermal envelope. The continuous insulation and airtight qualities of the SIP home allow it to use 32%-46% less energy than the HUD compliant homes in the same locations. Manufactured homes require much more energy to heat and cool because the HUD code does not require a certain performance criteria be met for the airtightness of manufactured homes and the overall U-values it requires for the thermal envelopes of such homes is too high for the varying climate zones found in the U.S. If SIP panels were to be used for the thermal envelope of the manufactured housing industry, low income manufactured home owners could be saving $300-$700 annually in energy costs. These savings are not insignificant to low income households and could create a 5-8 year payback period of additional ownership costs under $2500. Unfortunately, the SIP industry cannot offer its product at a low enough price to compete with the economies of scale achieved by the manufactured housing industry when buying raw construction materials. The value of this research then, is the exposure of the manufactured home’s inferior envelope performance when compared to more modern construction technologies and the speculation of how the manufactured housing industry could begin to incorporate a more robust building envelope without putting its customers at a monetary disadvantage.

Following continued emission of greenhouse gases climate change is increasingly becoming a greater threat to the continued well-being of people around the world. While airports contribute around 2.5% of the global greenhouse emissions it delivers the greenhouse gases higher up in the atmosphere which increases the negative effect of greenhouse gases. In response airports around Sweden are working towards implementing green airports and flights. This will be done in part by supplying the facility with green energy from local green power facilities but also in part by replacing the traditional fuel from petroleum-based flights to electrical flights. This report examines the required solar plant to support both the existing facility and the future planned electrical flights with solar energy. This report will examine the required size and configuration of the solar plant to supply necessary power with the help of the simulation tool SAM and weather data from NSRDB. This report will also investigate the current system capabilities and required changes to handle the increased load demand and power production into the facility using power flow simulations of the current system with the future loads

In order to provide Sweden and other countries across the globe with energy in a long-term and sustainable manner that accounts for our global environmental goals, we need to adopt more sources of renewable energy. Solar panels and other forms of solar power is one of these renewable energy sources that has a lot of potential and the technology has become increasingly more common in Sweden and other parts of the world in the latest decades. Everyone from private individuals to companies and authorities are increasingly making investments in the technology. With the help of our supervisors and after extensive literature studies we aim to increase the knowledge about solar panels and their economic aspects by calculating and presenting payback periods for solar panels implemented in nonbuilding structures. In conjunction with this we also aim to present a basic theoretical background about solar panels and their global impact to further the understanding of the technology even more. On behalf of, and in collaboration with Trafikverket we have examined the payback periods of four solar panel installations in connection to four of the authority´s nonbuilding structures. Three of these solar installations are applied on technical buildings that are scattered alongside the railway system across the country. The solar panels provide local electricity to the electrical components within the building. The fourth solar installation is connected to a road tunnel where it provides local electricity to the lights within the tunnel. The conducted calculations have resulted in a payback period for each respective solar installation measured in years based on various relevant factors that influence their energy production. Our hope is that this can clarify the economic aspects of the solar panels and be of help in potential future investments in solar power by Trafikverket. The conclusion is that the solar panel installation connected to the road tunnel has the shortest payback period by far and also has great potential to be economically lucrative by generating future revenue. The tree solar installations connected to the technical buildings each have a significantly longer payback period but are still expected to be paid back eventually. However they are not expected to generate a mentionable yield, if any. / För att vi ska kunna förse Sverige och resterande delar av världen med energi på ett långsiktigt och hållbart sätt som tar hänsyn till de globala miljömålen krävs det att vi börjar använda mer förnyelsebara energikällor. Solceller och solenergi är en av dessa energikällor som har stor potential och tekniken har under de senaste decennierna blivit allt vanligare både i Sverige och i andra delar av världen. Allt från privatpersoner till företag och myndigheter gör i större och större utsträckning investeringar i tekniken. Med hjälp av litteraturstudier samt stöd från handledare syftar denna avhandling till att öka kunskapen om solceller och deras ekonomiska aspekter genom att beräkna och presentera återbetalningstider för solceller implementerade i anläggningskonstruktioner. I samband med detta kommer en grundläggande teoretisk bakgrund om solceller samt deras globala påverkan att presenteras för att öka förståelsen för ämnet ytterligare. På uppdrag av och i samarbete med Trafikverket har återbetalningstiden för fyra solcellsinstallationer i anslutning till myndighetens anläggningar undersökts. Tre av dessa är teknikhus längs med järnvägen utspridda i olika delar av landet där solcellsinstallationen bidrar med elektricitet till de tekniska komponenterna i huset. Den fjärde installationen ligger i anslutning till en vägtunnel där solcellsinstallationen bidrar med elektricitet till belysningen i tunneln. Resultatet av beräkningarna har gett en återbetalningstid i år för respektive installation baserat på diverse relevanta parametrar som påverkar elproduktionen. Vår förhoppning är att detta kan klargöra de ekonomiska aspekterna av solcellerna samt underlätta för Trafikverket att ta beslut om framtida potentiella solcellsinvesteringar i anslutning till deras anläggningar. Slutsatsen är att solcellsinstallationen i anslutning till vägnätet har den överlägset kortaste återbetalningstiden samt även god potential att bli ekonomiskt lukrativ. De tre installationerna i anslutning till teknikhusen har betydligt längre återbetalningstid och anses så småningom bli återbetalda men utan någon nämnvärd avkastning, om ens någon. / FoI Solenergi

Wind loads acting on wooden building structures need to be dealt with adequately in order to ensure that neither the serviceability limit state nor the ultimate limit state is exceeded. For the structural designer of tall buildings, avoiding the possibly serious consequences of heavy wind loading while taking account at the same time of the effects of gravitation can be a real challenge. Wind loads are usually no major problem for low buildings, such as one- to two-storey timber structures involving ordinary walls made by nailing or screwing sheets of various types to the frame, but when taller structures are designed and built, serious problems may arise. Since wind speed and thus wind pressure increases with height above the ground and the shear forces transmitted by the walls increase accordingly, storey by storey, considerable efforts can be needed to handle the strong horizontal shear forces that are exerted on the bottom floor in particular. The strong uplift forces that can develop on the wind side of a structure are yet another matter that can be critical. Accordingly, a structure needs to be anchored to the substrate or to the ground by connections that are properly designed. Since the calculated uplift forces depend very much upon the models employed, the choice of models and simplifications in the analysis that are undertaken also need to be considered carefully. The present licentiate thesis addresses questions of how wind loads acting on multi-storey timber buildings can be best dealt with and calculated for in the structural design of such buildings. The conventional use of sheathing either nailed or screwed to a timber framework is considered, together with other methods of stabilizing timber structures. Alternative ways of using solid timber elements for stabilization are also of special interest. The finite element method was employed in simulating the structural behaviour of stabilizing units. A study was carried out of walls in which sheathing was nailed onto a timber frame. Different structural levels were involved, extending from modelling the performance of a single fastener and of the connection of the sheathing to frame, to the use of models of this sort for studying the overall structural behaviour of wall elements that possess a stabilizing function. The results of models used for simulating different load cases for walls agreed reasonably well with experimental test results. The structural properties of the fasteners binding the sheathing to the frame, as well as of the connections between the members of the frame were shown to have a strong effect on the simulated behaviour of shear wall units. Regarding solid wall panels, it was concluded that walls with a high level of both stiffness and strength can be produced by use of such panels, and also that the connections between the solid wall panels can be designed in such a way that the shear forces involved are effectively transmitted from one panel to the next.

The increasing demand for energy, depletion of fossil fuels, rising global warming, and greenhouse gas emissions have stimulated the need for widespread development and adoption of renewable energy sources (RES) worldwide. Among these sources, solar energy has emerged as a major contender to meet the growing demand. It offers adaptable applications and provides an alternative to traditional energy sources. A brand-new application of solar panels is agrivoltaics. Agrivoltaics consists in installing solar panels above farming lands such as crops. The combination of solar energy production and farming on the same lands increases the overall yield of the land and brings several other opportunities. However, agrivoltaics is also very challenging. An improper installation of solar panels above crops may result in a dramatic drop of the farming yield. Thus, it is of major importance to understand how to maximize the solar energy production without harming the plants or decrease the farming yield. This master’s thesis focuses on the impact of agrivoltaic systems on the micro-climate close to the crop. The goal is to link the modified physical phenomena within an agrivoltaic system and their impact on the crops. The methodology is based on Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). The idea is to realize high fidelity simulations of the different physical phenomena and their coupling, and compare them to experimental data. Flow simulations coupled with radiative models and a surface model are realized in this perspective. The master’s thesis is divided in three parts. 1. Based on experimental data collected during three years at the EDF lab les Renardières, determine which physical phenomena impact the most the crop and what are the key parameters to study the growth of the plants. 2. Validate with experimental data from the atmospheric laboratory the SIRTA (Site Instrumental de Recherche par Télédétection Atmosphérique) of the engineering school Polytechnique, the radiative models and the surface model of the CFD software. 3. Study the impact of an agrivoltaic system on the identified physical phenomena with a simple geometry composed of one pitch of solar panel. The data study shows clearly that the plant temperature, the groundwater, and the radiation play crucial roles in the growth of the plant. A lack of radiation or groundwater will limit the growth of the crops. In addition, extreme temperatures can harm the crops. Consequently, this research project will firstly focus on capturing the impact of the solar panels on these three key parameters. Simulations are using a coupling of a 1D radiative model which is computationally fast and that can therefore be applied on a very large domain to compute the absorption of the atmospheric layers and the clouds, and a 3D radiative model which is able to capture the impact of an obstacle such as a solar panel. This coupling is validated for the shortwave radiation and the longwave radiation. Finally, full U-RANS simulations with the radiative models, the surface model and the - turbulence model are realized. The impact of the panels on the radiation field, the soil temperature, the specific humidity and on other fields such as the wind speed is well captured.

During the recent prolonged drought in La Guajira, Colombia, the child mortality rate surged to 23.4 per 1000. With the focal point in rural Alta Guajira, a lack of rainfall and wind resulted in an acute potable water scarcity. This paper presents data gathered from interviews conducted with members of the Wayúu indigenous group residing in Alta Guajira and the results surveying in field the solutions already present to the water scarcity. Four potential technological solutions were then devised and evaluated in this context: wind-driven wells, solar-driven wells, solar stills, and reverse osmosis desalination systems. This study shows that reverse osmosis desalination systems are economically unfeasible due to their high initial investment. Solar stills are concluded to be potentially viable for drought emergencies but prohibitively expensive due to their low productivity and area requirements. Solar-driven wells frequently break in the region, likely due to inadequate insulation in underground electrical components, but they represent a crucial yet non-existent complement for water production. Wind-driven wells are the most prominent water source, although relying solely on these creates significant risks. Hence a suggestion for mainly wind-driven production, complemented with solar-driven production, and backed by emergency systems of manual wells and solar stills is suggested.

No description available.

Stockholm lies at the top in Europe in terms of population growth. It is growing from 30,000 to 40,000 residents each year and therefor puts high demands on the regions development. One of the governments reactions to this housing problem was to approve a bill that would simplify the regulatory framework in the planning and building act. It will among other permit owners of a one-or two family houses to build a 25  compliment housing without a building permit, so called attefallshus. In this final project, a small 25  house is designed. The house was designed to have thin exterior walls to maximize the indoor living space and also to fulfill all the Boverkets regulations for permanent housing. Vacuum Insulated panels were used as an insulation material in the envelope to achieve the extra thin exterior walls to maximize the living space. Various different simulations were done to simulate: Heat- and moisture transfer through the exterior walls, thermal bridges, energy calculations and the daylight factor inside the house. Additional calculations were done in Excel to compare the mean U-value calculated in simulations. The moisture transfer simulation did show that there should not be any moisture problems in the exterior walls. The mean U-value calculations in Excel and in the simulations showed values less than the limitations of Boverkets building regulations.

Currently, a sustainable energy transition is underway to reduce CO2 emissions. To meet the targets outlined in international agreements like the Kyoto Protocol, a rapid expansion of renewable energy sources, particularly photovoltaic (PV) systems, is underway. Due to photovoltaic technology's rapid development and integration, reliable testing and evaluation methods are essential. This master's thesis is dedicated to developing a PV system simulator to study the PV systems. PV simulators serve as precious tools due to their capacity to control and replicate the environmental conditions experienced by PV panels. Consequently, these simulators facilitate thorough research, design refinement, and PV system performance assessment. The developed PV system simulator is essentially a PV remote lab, offering the capability to monitor, gather data, and evaluate the performance of the PV system remotely. The proposed system's flexibility and scalability enable its application to study various types of PV installation. The PV remote lab is expected to be a training centre for students and industry professionals. A comprehensive literature review on photovoltaic technology has been undertaken. Following the literature review, the different components that form a PV system have been defined and selected. The system will have a communication block to achieve a flexible and scalable PV remote lab. In this way, different configurations of the PV panels and different system outputs can be implemented. This commutation block can be remotely controlled using an Arduino, and an interface can be designed where the desired PV panel configurations and system outputs can be selected. In this interface, visualising the tests' results will also be possible. / För närvarande pågår en hållbar energiomställning för att minska koldioxidutsläppen. För att uppfylla de mål som fastställts i internationella avtal som Kyotoprotokollet pågår en snabb utbyggnad av förnybara energikällor, särskilt solcellssystem (PV). På grund av solcellsteknikens snabba utveckling och integration är tillförlitliga test- och utvärderingsmetoder av avgörande betydelse. Denna masteruppsats handlar om att utveckla en solcellssimulator för att studera solcellssystem. PV-simulatorer är värdefulla verktyg eftersom de kan kontrollera och återskapa de miljöförhållanden som PV-panelerna utsätts för. Följaktligen underlättar dessa simulatorer grundlig forskning, designförbättring och bedömning av PV-systemets prestanda. Den utvecklade PV-systemsimulatorn är i grunden ett fjärrstyrt PV-labb som gör det möjligt att övervaka, samla in data och utvärdera PV-systemets prestanda på distans. Det föreslagna systemets flexibilitet och skalbarhet gör att det kan användas för att studera olika typer av solcellsinstallationer. PV-fjärrlabbet förväntas bli ett utbildningscenter för studenter och yrkesverksamma inom branschen. En omfattande litteraturgenomgång om solcellsteknik har genomförts. Efter litteraturgenomgången har de olika komponenterna som bildar ett solcellssystem definierats och valts ut. Systemet kommer att ha ett kommunikationsblock för att uppnå ett flexibelt och skalbart PV-fjärrlabb. På så sätt kan olika konfigurationer av solcellspanelerna och olika systemutgångar implementeras. Detta kommutationsblock kan fjärrstyras med en Arduino och ett gränssnitt kan utformas där de önskade konfigurationerna av solcellspaneler och systemutgångar kan väljas. I detta gränssnitt kommer det också att vara möjligt att visualisera testresultaten.