Solar energy under cold climatic conditions: A review.

Solar energy has seen tremendous development in recent years towards fulfilling the energy requirements of our planet. This paper presents an extensive review of solar-energy-based technologies and research work conducted under cold climatic conditions. These conditions include mountainous, continental, cold oceanic and polar climates and in general, all climates where below Zero temperatures are common during the winter. This article describes the use of solar energy under cold conditions from various aspects: greenhouses, buildings and housing, heat pumps, heat storage, PV panels, solar thermal and PV/T, high-latitude issues, cooling, and policies. Both environmental and economic aspects are considered in this paper, and the zones covered more or less intensively are Central and Northern Europe, North America, Turkey, Iran, China, Japan, the Andes and Antarctica. This analysis shows that, for most cold climatic conditions, it is worth implementing solar energy technologies for certain uses. However, many parameters need to be carefully considered before concluding on the relevance of a given technology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]