Factors of very rapidly rising oil prices, the running out time limits on continued use of fossil fuels, as well as elements of the Kyoto Protocol, have greatly arouses the increasing emphasis on natural and renewable energy sources. 40 minutes of total solar radiation on earth could provide enough power to meet the energy needs of all human beings for approximately one year. The potential of solar energy is virtually limitedless. Moreover, by means of solar powered batteries, solar energy can be directly converted to electric power. Since it neither pollutes the environment or ecology, solar is an extremely clean source of energy. The life-span of solar cell is very long, possibly 20 years or more. The capability of solar batteries to provide energy is approximately proportional to the intensity of the sunlight. This thesis proposes the use of Artificial intelligence for "Sun Track Solar Energy System". This system employs Fuzzy Logic Control Theory, combined with Grey Relational Analysis, for tracking the angle of the sun, and further control the motor to adjust the angle for tracking, so direct sunlight could be acquired to increase power output. As a result of the experiment, comparing the electricity generated from the fix angle solar battery with the AI-based Sun Track Solar Energy System, the latter one has an efficiency increase up to 23% for the same amount of sunlight.

Die Untersuchungen zur Nutzung der Solarenergie werden für die klimatischen Bedingungen von Vietnam durchgeführt. Um das Problem der Elektroenergieversorgung in Vietnam zu verringern und um speziell den Lebensstandard in den ländlichen Gebieten zu erhöhen, werden Anstrengungen unternommen, um Anwendungen der Solarenergie zu entwickeln. Es wäre erstrebenswert, wenn ein komplettes Solartechniksystem zur Hausversorgung zur Verfügung stehen würde. Der Konzipierung und Auslegung der Solartechnik wird ein sog. Referenzhaus zugrunde gelegt, das hinsichtlich seiner Bauweise und Größe typisch für die ländlichen Gegenden in Mittel- und Südvietnam ist. Der Gesamtenergiebedarf orientiert sich an der Lebensweise und der Anzahl der Hausbewohner. Erforderlich ist die Bereitstellung von Warmwasser am Tage sowie von Kälte, die für Frischhaltung von Nahrungsmitteln auch nachts erzeugt werden kann. Dies wird als solares Warmwasser- und Kälteerzeugungssystem bezeichnet. Für die Überwindung von Höhenunterschieden bei der Wasserförderung wird ein solarer Stirlingmotor als Pumpenantrieb in Betracht gezogen. Zur Warmwasserbereitung sollen geeignete Solarkollektoren verwendet werden. Zur Kälteerzeugung scheint sich ein Adsorptionskälteaggregat vorteilhaft in das Gesamtsystem einzuordnen.

<p>The main questions concerning energy technologies today are their economical and environmental impacts. These entities are (at the present) assessed on the basis that operations proceed as newly installed/designed systems, during an assumed working life period. While this is the common way of perceiving energy systems, performance-over-time will change as an effect of (e.g. material) degradation and not solely of different operation scenarios. How and to what extent, is the question that needs assessing in order to evaluate if these changes will jeopardise the intended system performance requirement. In turn, this pro-active assessment and analysis is in line with today’s performance based directives, laws, regulations and concepts; of which the working life is an essential part.</p><p>The main context of the thesis, is a contribution to the Research and Development (R&D) topic on life performance of energy technologies, with papers on a literature review and case study on two system parts: <i>solar collector and ground heat exchanger (borehole)</i>; within the energy technology area of combined solar energy technologies/systems utilised in buildings. The thesis specifically presents a general description of requirements on constructed works and their material, components and systems. It also gives an insight to the energy technology R&D and engineering sector, regarding durability and service life assessment methodologies; and also to the durability of constructed works sector, regarding the needs for assessing material degradation in relation to system performance. The case studies presented in the thesis, show how durability of energy technologies may be sought-after, as well as specific knowledge and useful tools, methodologies and test setups for assessing long-term performance of combined solar energy technologies (in this case a solar-assisted heat pump system utilising a building integrated Unglazed Solar Collector and energy storage).</p><p>The utilisation of solar collectors and heat pumps (primarily for space and domestic tap water heating) has rapidly increased in Sweden during the last decades. Sweden has today the largest heat pump market in Europe. During recent years, there has also been an increased interest in heating systems that combine heat pumps with solar collectors (glazed and unglazed) and energy storages; with the aim of attaining a system that provides higher energy and greater economical performances than individual solar collector or heat pump systems. If these systems are to be successful they must be economically feasible; placing emphasis on the cost, durability and performance of the system.</p><p>The main issue on life performance of energy technologies is how and to what extent, performance reduction in individual materials and components influences the overall system performance; as the essence of energy system sustainability is system performance.</p>

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Rutgers University, 2009. / "Graduate Program in Materials Science and Engineering." Includes bibliographical references (p. 164-172).

Thesis (B. Arch.)--Roger Williams University, 2009. / Title from title page screen (viewed on Feb. 4, 2009) Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, Riverside, 2009. / Includes abstract. Available via ProQuest Digital Dissertations. Title from first page of PDF file (viewed March 12, 2010). Includes bibliographical references. Also issued in print.

Multilevel inverters offer many well-known advantages for use in high-voltage and high-power applications, but they are also well suited for low-power applications. A single phase inverter is developed in this paper to deliver power from a residential-scale system of Photovoltaic panels to the utility grid. The single-stage inverter implements a novel control technique for the reversing voltage topology to produce a stepped output waveform. This approach increases the granularity of control over the PV systems, modularizing key components of the inverter and allowing the inverter to extract the maximum power from the systems. The adaptive controller minimizes harmonic distortion in its output and controls the level of reactive power injected to the grid. A computer model of the controller is designed and tested in the MATLAB program Simulink to assess the performance of the controller. To validate the results, the performance of the proposed inverter is compared to that of a comparable voltage-sourced inverter.

D. Tech. Mechanical Engineering, Mechatronics and Industrial Design / South Africa has limited reserve electricity resources and many parts of the country have limited access to electricity. Electricity production capacity is at maximum and almost each Giga watt is accounted for. Predictions suggest South Africa would have a serious electricity allocation problem in the very near future and current rolling blackout in many of our cities can attest to the looming problem. The energy crisis in South Africa has highlighted the need to increase electricity generation capacity and to search for alternative energy sources. Solar chimney plants could form part of the solution in the near future in South Africa to create additional power. This study aimed to develop a wind generation system in areas where wind is absent. A solar chimney power plant is expected to provide remote areas in South Africa with electric power, or to complement the current electricity grid. Solar energy and the psychometric state of the air are important to encourage the full development of a solar chimney power plant for the thermal and electrical production of energy for various uses. Research within the South African context and particularly on increasing the effectiveness of the solar chimney power plant technology is lacking; as such this study proposes the development of a solar chimney plant and associated technology to ensure the effectiveness of this plant.

Renewable energy sources have become very popular in the last years in electricity generation thanks to the technological developments, the increase in the price of fossil fuels and the environmental concerns. These factors have also prompted Turkey to utilize her very rich renewable energy sources to meet the demand increasing around 7% annually. In this study, solar and wind energy potential of Turkey is analyzed in terms of its economics to find out whether these sources are real alternatives to fossil fuels in electricity generation. Before this analysis, wind and solar energy technologies and costs and wind and solar energy potential of Turkey are discussed. Then, models are set up for five technologies which are onshore wind, offshore wind, solar PV, solar trough and solar tower technologies models to calculate cash flows which are used to calculate payback, NPV, IRR, LCE and shut-down price to conduct economic analysis. In addition to base case scenario, uncertainty analysis is done for the most promising technologies which are onshore wind and solar tower technologies by evaluating NPV and LCE under uncertain environment. The main finding of these analyses is that only onshore wind projects are attractive in Turkey; none of other technologies is attractive. However, with a minor increase in the regulated price for solar thermal electricity, tower plant projects will also be attractive. / text

No description available.