The global market share of renewable electricity generation increased at an average compound rate of 15% between 2015 and 2020 and 348 GW in 2022 alone, which could result in a renewable share of 45% in energy generation by 2030 if the current trend continues. Therefore, action is required to reduce the number of suboptimal solutions resulting from the accelerated adoption rate, while ensuring the continued exponential growth. A novel approach to streamline the workflow in residential solar installation design processes through the development of a digital tool is proposed. The solution is structured into two layers. The first layer comprises a Simulink model of the most prevalent solar technologies, namely Photovoltaic (PV), Solar Thermal (ST) and Photovoltaic Thermal (PVT). The second layer contains an economic analysis tool developed in MATLAB. The initial model performs a transient simulation of the solar installation over the course of a year, considering generic client-provided inputs, such as the available surface area, energy consumption, solar panel model, location and ambient conditions, and then extrapolates for the lifespan of the system. Subsequent to this, the second layer utilises the outputs from the Simulink model to conduct an economic analysis, identifying the key economic parameters of the installation with the objective of determining the optimal technical parameters, such as collector area, storage size and solar share, among others. A case study was conducted on a Swedish residential building with limited roof area, utilising the developed tool, with a changing number of installed solar panels. The electric and thermal effective efficiencies varied from 9.2% to 10.9% and from 20.2% to 51.8% for PV and ST systems, respectively, depending on the number of panels in the installation. For PVT systems, the effective electric, thermal and total efficiencies varied from 9.0% to 11.5%, 17.2% to 43.7%, and 26.3% to 55.2%, respectively. A Net Present Value (NPV) analysis indicated that the optimal installation comprised 70 PV panels and 30 ST panels, resulting in an NPV of €117 888.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:hig-44358 |
| Date | January 2024 |
| Creators | Parra Cerecedo, Eric |
| Publisher | Högskolan i Gävle, Energisystem och byggnadsteknik |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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