Energy Conversion and Management 77 (2014) 527534

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Energy Conversion and Management

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/enconman

Efciencies and improvement potential of building integrated

photovoltaic thermal (BIPVT) system
Adnan Ibrahim a, Ahmad Fudholi b,, Kamaruzzaman Sopian b, Mohd Yusof Othman b,
Mohd Hadz Ruslan b
a
b

Universiti Kuala Lumpur Institute of Product Design and Manufacturing (UniKL IPROM), 56100 Cheras, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Solar Energy Research Institute, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 26 June 2013
Accepted 10 October 2013

Keywords:
BIPVT system
Energy analysis
Exergy analysis
Primary-energy saving efciency
Improvement potential

a b s t r a c t
Building integrated photovoltaic thermal (BIPVT) system has been designed to produce both electricity
and hot water and later integrated to building. The hot water is produced at the useful temperatures
for the applications in Malaysia such as building integrated heating system and domestic hot water system as well as many industrial including agricultural and commercial applications. The photovoltaic thermal (PVT) system comprises of a high efciency multicrystal photovoltaic (PV) module and spiral ow
absorber for BIPVT application, have been performed and investigated. In this study, it was assumed that
the absorber was attached underneath the at plate single glazing sheet of polycrystalline silicon PV
module and water has been used as a heat transfer medium in absorber. Performances analysis of BIPVT
system based on energy and exergy analyses. It was based on efciencies including energy and exergy,
and exergetic improvement potential (IP) based on the metrological condition of Malaysia has been carried out. Results show that the hourly variation for BIPVT system, the PVT energy efciency of 5562% is
higher than the PVT exergy efciency of 1214%. The improvement potential increases with increasing
solar radiation, it is between 98 and 404 W. On the other hand, BIPVT system was produced primaryenergy saving efciency from about 73% to 81%.
2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
The last few years have seen the development of renewable
energy (RE) systems based mainly on wind and solar energy [1].
Presently, research and development programmes in developing
countries are oriented towards the applications of solar energy
for domestic hot water systems, solar distillation of sea and
brackish water, water pumping, drying of agricultural produce,
solar industrial process heat, and photovoltaic (PV) for remote
applications. However, in developed countries extensive work
have been carried out on space heating and cooling (passive and
active design), building integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) systems
and products, grid connected RE system including biomass and
PV system, daylighting, solar thermal electricity generation, and
solar refrigeration [2]. A new hybrid geothermal and solar driven
absorption cooling system was proposed for low-temperature
district energy applications [3].
Many researches towards the solar energy occur all over the
word to the concern of global crisis on oil and gas prices. According
to some experts, oil has ready started to peak. Gas and coal

Corresponding author.
E-mail address: a.fudholi@gmail.com (A. Fudholi).
0196-8904/$ - see front matter 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2013.10.033

reserves are bigger than oil, will tend to be progressively replaced

by the former, which should attenuate a price explosion. Nevertheless this process will push energy prices higher, until sustainable
sources replace dependency on fossil fuels as major source of
energy. The sustainable energy such as solar energy has been identied as one of the promising source of energy to replace the
dependency on fossil fuels. Solar energy is a clean energy which
has the potential to meet a signicant proportional of the worlds
energy needs. It can be broadly classied into two systems; PV energy system which converts solar energy into electrical energy, and
thermal energy system which converts solar energy into thermal
energy. The inspiration of combining PV and solar collector to provide electrical and heat energy is not new, however it is an area
that has received only limited attention. With concern growing
over energy sources and their usage, PVT has become an area
which is receiving much more attention. PVT systems convert solar
radiation directly to both electrical and thermal energies. A PVT
system basically combines the functions of a at plate solar collector and those of a photovoltaic (PV) panel. Innovative applications
of PVT system were performed recently [410].
The research on PVT started during the mid-1970s, with the
focus on PVT systems, and the main aim with increase of the PV
efciency. Domestic application was regarded as the main market.

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A. Ibrahim et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 77 (2014) 527534

Nomenclature
Ac
b
Cb
Cp
D
Dh
F
F0
FR
GT
h
k
L
l
_
m
N
n
p
Qu
S
T
UL
Ut

frontal area solar collector (m2)

collector width (m)
conductance of the bond between the n and square
tube
specic heat of working uid (J/kg C)
diameter (m)
hydraulic diameter (m)
n efciency factor
collector efciency factor
heat removal efciency factor
solar radiation at NOCT (W/m2)
heat transfer coefcient of uid (W/m2 C)
thermal conductivity (W/m C)
tube length (m)
thickness (m)
mass ow rate (kg/s)
number of glass cover
number of tube
collector perimeter (m)
useful thermal energy (W)
solar radiation (W/m2)
temperature (C)
overall heat transfer coefcient (W/m2 C)
top loss coefcient (W/m2 C)

Initially the focus was on glazed collectors, both air based and
water based. Due to these problems, the cost for a complete system
of PVT is incredibly high and unaffordable to the industrial and residential owners. One of the most attractive application of PVT air or
water based collectors are building integrated photovoltaic thermal (BIPVT) which has undergone rapid developments in recent
years. BIPVT system is a promising system to generate both energies due to its higher reliability system with lower environment
impact. Generally, the BIPVT system consists of the PV module,
absorber in the formed of tubes, the glass cover (transparent)
and insulated container. It is expected that over the next few years,
there will be a rapid growth in BIPVT publications and products
[1113].
Several studies on BIPVT systems have been conducted. It was
theoretically analyzed based on modied HottelWhillier model
and was validated with experimental data from testing on a prototype BIPVT system [14]. The importance of inuence of design
parameters such as the n efciency, the thermal conductivity
between the PV cells and their supporting structure, and the lamination method on both the electrical and thermal efciency of the
BIPVT remarked. Furthermore, it was shown that the BIPVT could
be made of lower cost materials, such as pre-coated colour steel,
without signicant decreases in efciency. It was also concluded
that integration of BIPVT into the building rather than onto the
building could results in a lower cost system. In one research work
on water-based BIPVT system, a numerical model of wall-mounted
water-based PVT systems were developed by modifying the HottelWhillier model, which was originally for the thermal analysis
of at-plate solar thermal collectors.
A dynamic simulation model on a water-based BIPVT system
introduced and the validity of this modeling approach was demonstrated through comparison with experimental data [15]. The results depicted that other than the electrical performance has
been affected by the on-site shading problem, the output from
the model showed good compliance with the experimental
observations.

m
W

a
h

e
s
g
r

wind velocity (m/s)

tube spacing (m)
absorptance
collector tilt
emittance
transmittance
efciency
Stefans Boltzmann constant (W/m2 C4)

Subscripts
a
ambient
abs
absorber thickness
c
cell

inlet uid
g
glass
i
inlet
o
outlet
p
plate
pm
mean plate
PV
photovoltaic
PVT
photovoltaic thermal
r
reference
t
tube
w
wind

A computer simulation with energy models developed for

water-based BIPVT system. Higher economical advantages in comparison with conventional PV system obtained. The year-average
thermal and cell conversion efciencies for a specic BIPVT system
at a vertical wall of a fully air-conditioned building and with collectors equipped with at-box-type thermal absorber and polycrystalline silicon cell were respectively 37.5% and 9.39% compared
with the normal building faade [16].
A computational uid dynamic (CFD) model for a novel BIPVT
system was developed and validated it experimentally [17]. The result indicated that PV cell efciency can be raised up to 5.3% and
the outlet water temperature of collector was suitable for domestic
hot water use. Effect of ow distribution on the PV performance of
a water-based BIPVT system was investigated [18]. The results
shown that parameters including the manifold to riser pipe ratio,
array geometry, manifold ow direction, and mass ow rate to
have an inuence on ow distribution and therefore PV conversion.
Recently, performance analysis has been carried out exergy
analysis on BIPVT system. Performance analysis and life cycle cost
were evaluated for the BIPVT systems with different PV technology
compared with the similar BIPVT system. The results show that the
use of BIPVT systems was always advantageous both from the efciency and the economic point of view than similar BIPVT systems.
The mono-crystalline silicon BIPVT systems have higher energy
and exergy efciencies and were suitable where energy and exergy
demands were higher and space for mounting such systems were
limited, like multi-storey buildings [19].
BIPVT applications are among the cost effective solar energy
applications, however, a lot of research works still need to be done
and one of the most important part of research and development
works in this area should be allocated to design of new thermal absorber collectors. New design of BIPVT system is presented in this
paper. Prototype of this new absorber is constructed. Since few
studies of water-based BIPVT systems have been conducted till
now, therefore further experimental and analytical study should
be carried out aiming at incrementing our knowledge regarding

A. Ibrahim et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 77 (2014) 527534

529

Fig. 1. Spiral ow absorber.

improving electrical and thermal performance of BIPVT system

based on the energy and exergy analyses.
2. Material and method
Fig. 1 shows the spiral ow absorber of water-based BIPVT
system. The tube design is the simplest and easiest to be manufactured, even though, the efciency is 2% lower compared to other
types of absorbers such as, channel, free ow and two-absorber
[13]. The spiral ow absorber was made of rectangular hollow
tubes of stainless steel material with dimension of 12.7 
12.7 mm. The tube was connected using a welding method. The absorber, as shown in Fig. 2 consist of a single unilateral channel for
the water to ow in it with the size of 815  628  30 mm before it
was inserted underneath the standard photovoltaic panel with the
size of 1 m height, 0.65 m length and 0.3 m thickness. Thermal
insulator was packed underneath the absorber to prevent heat
from escaping further and provides more uniform temperatures
throughout the system. A standard PV panel represented as a at
plate single glazing sheet of polycrystalline silicon with single glazing sheet has been used. The spiral ow absorber was designed in
the form of continuous coil or tube congured. The spiral coil has
at least one inlet and outlet to allow medium (water) to enter
and to exit from coil respectively. The inlet and the outlet of the
spiral coil were arranged further away to the enter point of the
spiral. This will allow the medium (water) to ow in reversed
direction and covered the entire PV panel. The conguration: medium (water) with lower temperature enters the coil and ow into
the centre point and ow out from the centre point leaving the coil
as hot water. The hot water can be consumed or stored for later
use. In this way solar radiation energy can be fully utilized. In this
experiment, standard PV panel, rating at 80 W powers was used. As
shown in Fig. 3, the spiral ow absorber was inserted underneath
the standard PV panel and tested outdoor. As shown in Fig. 4,
ambient temperature and other temperatures were measured
using K-type thermocouple and located at several places. Solar
radiations from the sun were measured by Eppley pyranometer.
Mass ow rate for spiral ow absorber was set of 0.027 kg/s and
connected direct to data acquisition system which later link to
the computer. Data collected and stored in the ADAM Data Acquisition System for every 1 min and later used to calculate the perfor-

Fig. 3. Photograph of BIPVT system.

mances of BIPVT system. The analytical parameters of the BIPVT

system were presented in Table 1.
3. Energy analysis
The performance of PVT systems can be depicted by the combination of efciency expression [20]. It comprised of the thermal
efciency (gth) and the electrical efciency (gPV). These efciencies
usually include the ratio of the useful thermal gain and electrical
gain of the system to the incident solar irradiation on the collectors gap within a specic time or period. The analytical parameters
of the PVT system are presented in Table 2. The total of the efciencies, which is known as total efciency or PVT efciency (gPVT) is
used to evaluate the overall performance of the system [2022]:

gPVT gth gPV

Considering that electrical energy (gf) is a high-grade form of

energy gain, primary energy saving efciency is proposed as another performance evaluation method to recognize the energy
grade difference between electricity and thermal, which is given
by [2022]

gf

gPV
gth
gp

where gp is the electric-power generation efciency of the conventional power plant, its value can be taken as 38%. The evaluation
indicator of primary-energy saving efciency concerns both of the
quality and quantity of the energy that the PVT system converts solar energy too.
3.1. Energy analysis of at plate PVT system
The thermal performance of the PVT is affected by many system
design parameters and operating conditions. In this study, the system is analyzed with various congurations of solar radiation,
ambient temperature, and ow rate conditions. The collector is assumed to be represented as a at plate collector with single glazing
sheet. Based on this assumption, the thermal performance of the
PVT unit is evaluated for its thermal and photovoltaic performance,
as such, the derivation of the efciency parameters based on the
HottelWhillier equations were used [23]. The thermal efciency
of the conventional at plate solar collector is a ratio of the useful
thermal energy (Qu) to the overall incident solar radiation (S), and
can be written as:

gth
Fig. 2. The assembly view of spiral ow absorber.

Qu
S

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A. Ibrahim et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 77 (2014) 527534

Fig. 4. The schematic diagram of experimental setup.

Table 1
BIPVT system characteristics.

Q u Ac F R GT saPV  U L T i  T a 

Description

Symbol

Value

Unit

Ambient temperature
Collector area
Number of glass cover
Emittance of glass
Emittance of plate
Collector tilt
Fluid thermal conductivity
Specic heat of working uid
Back insulation conductivity
Back insulation thickness
Insulation conductivity
Edge insulation thickness
Absorber conductivity
Absorber thickness
Fin conductivity
Fin thickness
Heat transfer coefcient from
cell to absorber
Heat transfer inside tube
Transmittance
Absorptance

Ta
Ac
N
eg
ep
h
kf
Cp
kb
lb
ke
le
kabs
labs
kf
d
hca

20
0.65
1
0.88
0.95
14
0.613
4180
0.045
0.05
0.045
0.025
51
0.002
84
0.0005
45

C
m2

333
0.88
0.95

s
a

where Ac is the collector area, Ta is ambient temperature, Ti is inlet

temperature, UL is overall collector heat loss, (sa)PV is PV thermal
efciency, GT is solar radiation at NOCT (radiation level 800 W/m2,
wind velocity 1 m/s and ambient temperature at 26 C) and FR is
heat removal efciency factor introduced [23,24]:

W/m C
J/kg C
W/m C
m
W/m C
m
W/m C
m
W/m C
m
W/m C
W/m C

References

gPV = 9.5%, gth = 50%, gPVT = 59.5%

gPV = 9%, gth = 38%, gPVT = 47%
gPVT = 65% at 0 C operation temperature
gPV = 11%, gth = 51%, gPVT = 62%
gf = 64.9%
gPV = 9.87%, gth = 40%, gPVT = 49.87%
gPV = 10.15%, gth = 45%, gPVT = 55.15%
gPV = 11.411.3%, gth = 4551%, gPVT = 5562%
gf = 7381%

[21]
[35]
[36]
[37]

where F0 is collector efciency factor, which calculated using:

"

1
UL

U L Dh W  Dh F

1
1

C b 2a bhfi

where a is width of the duct, b is height of the duct, Cb is conductance of the bond between the n and square tube, h is heat transfer coefcient of uid, Dh is hydraulic diameter and F is n efciency
factor, given by:

where

Dh

2ab
a b

The coefcient M of Eq. (8) is a term which takes into account both
the thermal conductivity of the absorber and the PV cell calculated
by [18,25]

[38]
[39]
Present study

The useful collected heat gain by the at plate solar collector could
either be given as the coupling results of average mass ow rate
_ heat capacity of owing medium (Cp) and temperature differm,
ence at the collector inlet (Ti) and outlet (To), can be written as:

_ p T o  T i
Q u mC




_ p
mC
Ac U L F 0
1  exp 
_ p
Ac U L
mC

FR



h
tanh M WD
2
F q
h
M WD
2

Table 2
The comparison present study with other absorber designs [21,3539].
Performance from energy analysis

The difference between the absorber solar radiation and thermal

heat losses is identied by HottelWhillier equations [24]:

s
UL
kabs labs kPV lPV

10

where kabs is absorber thermal conductivity, labs is absorber thickness, kPV is PVT conductivity, and lPV is PV collector thickness. The
collector overall loss coefcient (UL) is the sum of the edge (Ue)
and top (Ut) loss coefcients, can be written as:

UL Ue Ut
Ue

ke pl
L e Ac

11
12

A. Ibrahim et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 77 (2014) 527534

Ut

8
>
<
>
:

91
>
1=
h
ie
T pm T a
hw >
;

where

T pm

Nf

"

 4 !#
4 Ta 1 Ta
Exin Ac Nc S 1 

3 Ts 3 Ts



rT pm T a T 2pm T 2a

13



T a 273
Exth Q u 1 
T o 273

C 5201  0:000051b

14

ExPV gc Ac Nc S 1 

f 1 0:089hw  0:1166hw ep 1 0:07866N

15



100
e 0:43 1 
T pm

16

ep 0:00591Nhw

1

2Nf 10:133ep

eg

N

where

"

T pm T i

531

Q =Ac
1  F R
F R UL

17

where p is the collector perimeter, N is number of glass covers, r is

StefanBooltzmann constant, ep is emittance of plate, eg is emittance
of glass, b is collector tilt, Tpm is mean plate temperature and hw is
wind heat transfer coefcient.
The heat transfer coefcients, such as for forced convection (hw)
can be calculated by [26] and natural heat transfer (hnat) can be calculated by [26]:

  4 !#
4 Ta 1 Ta

3 Ts 3 Ts

ExPVT Exth ExPV

25

26

27
28

where Exin is input exergy (radiation exergy), Exo is output exergy,

Exth is thermal exergy, ExPVT is photovoltaic thermal exergy, Ac is
collector area, Nc is collectors number, S is solar radiation, Ta is
ambient temperature and Ts is sun temperature (Ts = 5777 K). The
_ d or irreversibility may be expressed as
exergy destruction Ex
[32,33]

Exd T a Sgen

29

hw 2:8 3:0v

18

where Sgen is entropy generation rate. While the irreversibility of

any energy process is at minimum, the improvement in the exergy
efciency is at maximum. The concept of an exergetic improvement potential (IP) could be considered as a very useful tool to
analyzing systems or process more efciently. The IP of a system
or process is given by [33,34].

hnat 1:78T pm  T a

19

_ d
IP 1  gex Ex

By combining the natural and forced convection heat transfer (Eqs.

(18) and (19)) enable to determine the overall convection heat
transfer (hc) and at the same time possible to determine the overall
top loss heat transfer coefcient for the collector [27].

hc

q
3
3
hw hnat

20

Referring from the Eqs. (3)(20), it is then possible to calculate

the useful heat gain produced by the PVT system. By rearranging
Eq. (3), the thermal efciency of the collector is expressed as [28]

gth F R saPV  F R U L



Ti  Ta
S

21

3.2. Theory of PV module

Electrical efciency of the PV module (gPV), which is a function
of module temperature given by [11,29]

gPV gr 1  cT c  T r

22

where gr is reference efciency of PV module (gr = 0.12), c is temperature coefcient (c = 0.0045 C), Tc is cell temperature and Tr is
reference temperature.
4. Exergy analysis
Energy analysis is based on the rst law of thermodynamics.
Exergy analysis is based on the second of law of thermodynamics,
which if the effects due to the kinetic and potential energy changes
are neglected, the general exergy balance can be expressed in rate
form as given [30,31].

Exin 

Exo

Exd

23

or

Exin 

X
X
Exth ExPV
Exd

24

30

where gex is the second law efciency may be expressed as

gex 1 

Exd
Exin

31

5. Results and observations

Characteristic of warm-humid equatorial climate like in Malaysia vary signicantly throughout the day. This is mainly due to the
formation of clouds creating sky patches and resulting in obstruction of the sun. Therefore the solar radiation penetration is not constant and the intensity of the solar radiation from the sky vaults is
a combination of direct sun, clear sky portion and from the cloudy
portion. The annual average daily solar radiation in Malaysia is 4
5 kW h/m2 with the monthly average daily sunshine duration
ranging from 4 to 5 h [11]. Fig. 5 shows the hourly average variation of solar radiation and ambient temperature for a typical day
in the middle of December 2010 for Malaysia. Fig. 5 shows the variation of PV temperatures versus the time. The PV temperature and
outlet temperature steadily increases with time and solar radiation. As the solar radiation decreases; the rate of increasing in temperature of PV and outlet temperature also decreases. A maximum
predicted PV temperature of 54 C, and 49 C for outlet temperature are obtained.
Referring to Fig. 5, the daily mean values of ambient temperature, outlet temperature and solar radiation varied from approximately 29 to 37 C, 3349 C, and 490890 W/m2 respectively,
with their corresponding average values being 34 C, 43 C and
690 W/m2 respectively. The PV, thermal and PVT energy varied
continuously with increasing solar radiation and time. The results,
the PV, thermal and PVT energy useful of BIPVT system varied from
34 to 60 W, 220435 W and 254495 W respectively at mass ow
rate of 0.027 kg/s.
Hence the energy that arrived at the heat absorber through the
PV module was reduced due to decreasing of solar radiation; this
lowered the heat gain of water at the absorber, therefore the water

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A. Ibrahim et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 77 (2014) 527534

Fig. 7. Variation of thermal and PVT efciencies as a function of the ratio (Ti  Ta)/S.

Fig. 5. Average hourly radiation, temperatures and performances with time.

temperature decreased. Fig. 6 shows the PV efciency declines as

PV temperature rise. The PV efciency is between 10.4% and
11.3%. In determining efciency of the BIPVT system, the effectiveness can be represented by an efciency curve, which indicates the
efciency versus the reduced temperature parameters or (Ti  Ta)/
S. Thermal and PVT efciencies as function of ratio of (Ti  Ta)/S are
shown in Fig. 7. The efciency curve decreases as the (Ti  Ta)/S increase. The thermal and PVT energy efciencies of BIPVT system
are ranging from 44% to 51% and 5562% respectively, as shown
in Fig. 7.
The performance of BIPVT systems can be depicted by the combination of efciency expression. It comprised of the electrical efciency and thermal efciency. The total of the both efciencies,
which is known as PVT efciency is used to evaluate the overall
performance of the system. Table 2 shows the summarized of comparison present study with other absorber designs [3539]. They
managed to achieve the PV efciency of 10.15% with 45% thermal
efciency in total efciency of 55.15%. Referring to [21], PVT water
based collector can achieve maximum electrical efciency of
around 9.5% and thermal efciency of about 50%. They have compared the conventional solar water heater the PVT system knows
as integrated photovoltaic/thermal system (IPV/TS). They concluded that the solar PVT system made from corrugated polycarbonate module produced good thermal efciency. They suggested
that further improvement could be achieved by proper insulation
for the PVT design. They managed to achieve the PV efciency of
9% with 38% thermal efciency in total efciency (PVT efciency)
of 47%.
An experiment of PVT system for domestic application in China
has been conducted [36,37]. In this experiment, an aluminium-alloy at box with square or rectangular shape channel has been designed and constructed. The test results shows high efciency on
combined system achieved with primary energy saving for daily
exposure approaches 65% at zero reduced temperature operation.

Fig. 6. PV efciency as a function of PV temperature.

They managed to achieve the PV efciency of 11% with 51% thermal efciency in total efciency (PVT efciency) of 62%. Similar
experiment has been performed using an aluminium-alloy at
box, with square or rectangular shape channel together with polycrystalline silicone cells utilized water as coolant for cooling purposes [38]. They conclude that the thermal efciency reached
around 40% when the initial temperature in the system is same
as the daily mean ambient temperature. They managed to achieve
the PV efciency of 9.87% with 40% thermal efciency in total efciency of 49.87%.
Another experiment on natural circulation hybrid PVT water
heating system has been studied [39]. In this experiment, sensitivity study of the system has been performed and proved that by
combining the system, the installation area produce more energy
per unit surface area than one PV module and one hot water
system.
Fig. 8 shows the hourly variation of PV, thermal, PVT and primary-energy saving efciencies for BIPVT system with spiral ow
absorber at mass ow rate of 0.027 kg/s. The collector were produced PVT efciency of 5562% with 10.411.3% PV efciency
and of 4551% thermal efciency, also it produced primary-energy
saving efciency from about 73% to 81%.
Fig. 9 shows the hourly variation of solar radiation and exergies
of the BIPVT system with spiral ow absorber. In Fig. 9 clearly
shows that PV, thermal and PVT exergy increase as the solar radiation increases. The PVT exergy is between 37 W and 71 W with
thermal exergy of 315 W, and electrical exergy of 3456 W. The
destruction and input exergies varied from 257 to 466 W and
297537 W respectively at mass ow rate of 0.027 kg/s.
Fig. 10 shows the hourly variation of outlet temperature, energy
and exergy efciencies. It is found that outlet temperature of collector increased with increased time until at 14.5 p.m with the outlet temperature is between 33 and 49 C. On the other, the PVT
energy efciency of 5562% is higher than the PVT exergy efciency of 1214%. Maximum PVT exergy efciency of 14% can be
seen at 1516.5 p.m. whereas minimum PVT exergy efciency of
12% is seen at 10.5 a.m. Fig. 11 clearly shows that the improvement
potential increase as the solar radiation increases. The improvement potential is between 98 and 404 W. Table 3 shows the exergy

Fig. 8. Changes of efciencies for BIPVT system over time at mass ow rates of
0.027 kg/s.

A. Ibrahim et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 77 (2014) 527534

533

efciency of PV/T system under study [40]. Also, Table 3 shows the
PV exergy efciency compared with a novel approach for estimation PV exergy efciency in exergy analyses [41].
6. Conclusion

Fig. 9. Changes solar radiation and exergies of BIPVT system over time at mass ow
rates of 0.027 kg/s.

The BIPVT system comprises of a combined PV module and spiral ow absorber has been investigated. The PV temperature increases when it absorbs solar radiation, causing a decrease in
efciency. From energy analysis at a mass ow rate of 0.027 kg/s
and average solar radiation of 690 W/m2, the average PV, thermal
and PVT energy efciencies were 10.8%, 48% and 59%, respectively.
Moreover from exergy analysis, the PVT exergy efciency and
improvement potential were 13.1% and 314 W. In this study, it
was found that the PVT energy efciency varies between 55% and
62% where as the variation in the PVT exergy efciency is from
12% to 14%. The improvement potential increases with increasing
solar radiation. The improvement potential is between 98 and
404 W.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation Malaysia for funding this research (Sciencefund 03-01-02-SF0039) and the Solar Energy Research Institute
(SERI), University Kebangsaan Malaysia for providing the laboratory facilities and technical support.
References

Fig. 10. Changes of energy and exergy efciencies and outlet temperature over time
at mass ow rate of 0.027 kg/s.

Fig. 11. Variation of improvement potential as a function of solar radiation.

Table 3
The comparison present study (exergy efciency) with other PV/T systems [40,41].
PV/T system

Exergy
efciency (%)

The glazed water-based PVT systems [40]

The coverless water-based PVT system [40]
The unglazed air-based PVT system [40]
The (glass-to-glass) air-based PVT system [40]
The unglazed air-based PVT integrated greenhouse with
earth air heat exchanger [40]
The unglazed air-based PVT integrated greenhouse [40]
The PV array [40]
The PV system [41]

813.30
1112.87
10.75
10.45
5.50

Present study

4
39
3.6511.34
(Classical)
2.5110.92
(New)
12.2913.79

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