Improving electrical energy and producing thermal energy in solar photovoltaic system by integrating phase change materials

Solar energy is a natural source that provides clean and renewable energy, which supplies two types of energy: thermal energy and photovoltaic energy. Whereas, the most effective way to exploit this energy is photovoltaic cells. However, for all the incident solar radiation, the solar panels can absorb a limited quantity of energy. While, the rest of radiation energy gets lost as heat, that increases the temperature of the photovoltaic cells, this is the reason why the productivity of electricity is decreased. Therefore, to exceed this issue and benefit from the two sources of sun radiation, a hybrid thermo-electrical system is proposed. The system is a solar panel surrounded by the phase change material that can absorb the temperature to increase the efficiency of solar system and use this energy to produce a hot water