Page 303 - A Comprehensive Guide to Solar Energy Systems

Chapter 14 • Advanced Building Integrated Photovoltaic/Thermal Technologies 307

14.4 Modeling Procedures and Performance Evaluation
of the Multifunctional BIPVT Panel

14.4.1 Laboratory Testing Setup

The performance of the prototype BIPVT panel was investigated at Columbia universi-
ty's Carleton laboratory via a solar simulator. The solar simulator was established in a
custome-built room with a temperature-controlled exhaust system, which cools the room
by forced-air ventilation as shown in Fig. 14.7A. A special metal-halide mHG lamp was
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assembled in the solar simulator, and provided an irradiance of up to 4 kW m . The solar
simulator was able to: (1) offer high irradiance efficiency and superior spatial uniformity
on the test area, (2) produce a dense multiline spectrum of the rare earths that is com-
parable to a continuous spectrum, and (3) provide a spectral distribution very close to
natural sunlight. during the test, the BIPVT panel was located under the solar lamp with
a fixed distance of 1422.4 mm from the top surface of the panel to the bottom edge of the
lamp. The irradiance intensity of the metal lamp was controlled by adjusting the power
output from the simulator controller (Fig. 14.7B), which ranges from 620 to 1250 W m at
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FIGURE 14.7 Performance evaluation of the BIPVT Panel. (A) Test setup, (B) simulator controller and flowmeter, (C) data
acquisition system, and (D) Pyranometer.