Search

Photovoltaics (PVs) are an effective technology to harvest the solar energy and satisfy the increasing global electricity demand. The effectiveness and life span of PVs could be enhanced by enabling effective thermal management. The conversion efficiency and surface temperature of PVs have an inverse relationship, and hence the cooling of PVs as an emerging body of work needs to have attention paid to it. The integration of a thermoelectric generator (TEG) to PVs is one of the widely applied thermal management techniques to improve the performance of PVs as well as combined systems. The TEG utilizes the waste heat of PVs and generate the additional electric power output. The nanofluid enables superior thermal properties compared to that of conventional cooling fluids, and therefore the performance of photovoltaic/thermal–thermoelectric generator (PV/T-TEG) systems with nanofluid cooling is further enhanced compared to that of conventional cooling. The TEG enables a symmetrical temperature difference with a hot side due to the heat from PVs, and a cold side due to the nanofluid cooling. Therefore, the symmetrical thermal management system, by integrating the PV/T, TEG, and nanofluid cooling, has been widely adopted in recent times. The present review comprehensively summarizes various experimental, numerical, and theoretical research works conducted on PV/T-TEG systems with nanofluid cooling. The research studies on PV/T-TEG systems with nanofluid cooling were reviewed, focusing on the time span of 2015–2021. This review elaborates the various approaches and advancement in techniques adopted to enhance the performance of PV/T-TEG systems with nanofluid cooling. The application of TEG with nanofluid cooling in the thermal management of PVs is an emerging research area; therefore, this comprehensive review can be considered as a reference for future development and innovations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The improvement in the quantitative and qualitative heat transfer performances of working fluids is trending research in the present time for heat transfer applications. In the present work, the first and second law analyses of a microplate heat exchanger with single-particle and hybrid nanofluids are conducted. The microplate heat exchanger with single-particle and hybrid nanofluids is analyzed using the computational fluid dynamics approach with symmetrical heat transfer and fluid flow analyses. The single-particle Al2O3 nanofluid and the hybrid Al2O3/Cu nanofluid are investigated for different nanoparticles shapes of sphere (Sp), oblate spheroid (OS), prolate spheroid (PS), blade (BL), platelet (PL), cylinder (CY) and brick (BR). The first law characteristics of NTU, effectiveness and performance index and the second characteristics of thermal, friction and total entropy generation rates and Bejan number are compared for Al2O3 and Al2O3/Cu nanofluids with considered different-shaped nanoparticles. The OS- and PL-shaped nanoparticles show superior and worse first and second law characteristics, respectively, for Al2O3 and Al2O3/Cu nanofluids. The hybrid nanofluid presents better first and second law characteristics compared to single-particle nanofluid for all nanoparticle shapes. The Al2O3/Cu nanofluid with OS-shaped nanoparticles depicts maximum values of performance index and Bejan number as 4.07 and 0.913, respectively. The first and second law characteristics of the best combination of the Al2O3/Cu nanofluid with OS-shaped nanoparticles are investigated for various volume fractions, different temperature and mass flow rate conditions of hot and cold fluids. The first and second law characteristics are optimum at higher hot fluid temperature, lower cold fluid temperature, lower hot and cold fluid mass flow rates. In addition, the first and second law characteristics have improved with increase in volume fraction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]