Performance of a V-trough photovoltaic system

Abstract

This paper presents a novel optical simulation of a design of the V-trough concentrator used with photovoltaic modules by ray-tracing method. The V-trough concentrator is two flat reflectors fixed on the photovoltaic module as a V latter in order to increase the income solar radiation to the photovoltaic. The advantages of using the V-trough is increasing of the income solar radiation to the photovoltaic which leads to increasing in the current output of the photovoltaic as well as the overall power output for the same size of the photovoltaic. The main aim of this paper is to utilize advanced ray tracing simulation to predict the concentration coefficient of a V-trough concentrator and compare the simulation results with the published experimental results. The results show that the difference between the simulation and experimental results is 1.99% indicating good agreement between the simulation and the experimental work.