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the company DualSun has a panel that can take in pool water to heat the pool while cooling the panels. If no pool, they can also be used to preheat water for your water heaters or go to any heat exchanger. It's a pretty cool system.
Was just about to mention them; currently planning to use some of those, and send the heat to a geothermal well that will provide heat for my house in the winter.
Being in a desert area I can't do the water idea but I did put a fan under one of my panels and got a better watt hour return than without the fan. Just moving air on the underside helped a lot!
If you ever get more panels in the future you might consider closed loop water cooling. I believe the panels need to be purpose built for it, but there's (almost) no water loss in closed loop systems and you can use the waste heat in the water to heat other things.
Dang... so essentially the cooling made it so you got more wattage per hour, more than enough to also power the fan? that's awesome if so. so basically the only cost was the fan. my next question would be how long until the fan is paid off?
a slightly hacky thing you could try is to stick old computer cpu cooling fins to the back of the pannel to move more of the heat from the pannel to the air
Instead of pouring lots of cold water on the panels, you could try to spray a little mist. Then water evaporating would cool the panels with minimal water consumption.
I was thinking the same thing… misters are great as they really don’t use a lot of water… most people think they are wasting water, but refuse to switch to composting toilets… but, whatever
no reason you have to letting the water just runoff into the ground. Assuming a roof mount system run the water over the panels, it drains into the gutter. downspout flows into a catch barrel with a small pump that sends the water back up over the panels. install a float switch in the barrle that adds tap water if the level drops below whatever minimum amount you need for the pump. Assuming you reduce leaks going elsewhere it shouldn't be any more water loss than you'd have from a mister evaporation. The main question is does the power gains outweigh the energy usage of the recirculating pump.
The problem is less the water, since you can simply capture it with a rainwater harvesting system and re-use it. The question is if you gain more power than you need to have a pump running all day. Maybe it helps if you just turn the pump on for about 20 seconds every minute, but that might drastically reduce the lifespan of the pump and might leave your panels covered in mineral residue left by the evaporating water.
There's actually a "starts per hour" rating for larger motors, but I wouldn't expect it to apply here. But if it becomes an issue then a soft start for the motor would be the way to go. And there are other ways to cool off the panels without running water over the glass on the panel (think water cooling found on PCs), such as a closed loop system that heats your water for home use by way of a heat exchanger. Now would these modifications be worth doing? Single use water dripping across the top of the panels would be a horrible use of water, and probably (hopefully) illegal in most places. A closed loop system that circulates captured coolant (antifreeze) and the dumps the heat into something that you want heated (hot water heater, pool, heating the house, etc), as a secondary use, or if you don't need the heat, sinking the heat into the soil would be far more efficient, and potentially reduce your energy costs in other areas of your home. I don't think that I would do it for a meager 5% electrical gain. I would have so see a marked improvement in energy production as well as a cost savings in the secondary uses.
@@MrWaalkman I think the same way. Was also thinking of a liquid cooling loop like the one used for PC's. It could be applied to the back of the panels using heat transfer paste (like the one used on CPU's). But 5% is just not worth the time and money. Another possible option on tilt roofs could be to capture wind from the line along the top of the roof and get it to blow under the panels. But It would only work when there is enough wind... and if there is too much wind it might get your panels airborne (if unlucky along with the roof)
The water is the less efficient way to address the problem. There are companies that are bonding heatsinks on the back of the PV cells and 'stealing' power from the cells to run wash-down fans controlled by a simple thermal diode. ua-cam.com/video/Mt9qLRN7JvA/v-deo.html Tech Ingredients did a breakdown of it, and discussed using water briefly, but dismissed it mainly because a pump is a lot more power intensive to run, and the net effect is only about 5-7% where the heatsink and fan arrangement was 10-12% for a smaller power investment. I'd give that a look because the discussion is a bit more in-depth.
just imagine in california middle of a years long drought they're pouring water over their solar panels for a 5% power gain. the streets are muddy, nearly flooded. the liberal influencers are ranting about how the 5% power gain is "good for the environment". and the california government is taxing you on every mile you drive down those flooded, soot-filled roads.
you don't have to waste it, you can repurpose 95% of the water that goes down so that it goes directly to trees/plants to water them, or you can collect it in water tanks.
also the system would only run during hot hours by using a thermostat, so it never wastes water during the night or when the temperature is already cooler.
Thanks for making this excellent comparison. One cooling option is to use thermal conductive glue to attach aluminum heat sinks to the back of the panel. You could even hook up a separate solar powered fan to draw air over the heat sinks.
Yeah, that has some potential. Thanks for the idea. Increasing the shaded surface area with a little airflow would probably make a measurable difference. Sounds like I need to go shop for some aluminum 😁
Thanks for doing the test. I think the 5% extra energy production seems low and probably will scale up to more if done over a home sized array of 2000+ watts. I've hosed down a solar arrays in the middle of the day and noticed upwards 10% power increase on just the watt output. But, in addition to using up a lot of water, a big problem with is *hard water* stains on the panel's glass from using normal city tap water. Those minerals will get _baked in_ even harder with the intense daily UV and heating. Personal experience. As someone else mentioned, this can only be practical with a heat sink system on the back of the panel: (a) no hard water stains (b) low to zero water waste as water is circulated Requires a lot more materials like hosing, valve, heatsink, anti-bacterial additives, etc. If its going to give 10% energy gain then might as well spend 10% more on panels and spend less money and time. The ever falling prices of solar panels makes that the best alternative to get more energy output. However... I do like this idea of having a substantial behind-the-panel cooling system that would also save the heated water to a solar tank. That way, the house is getting much more energy efficiency from solar panels well beyond the ~21% efficiency of the latest generation solar panels. Look up "2-in1 DualSun SPRING hybrid panel" that has all the heatsink and hosing built into each panel. The manufacturer claims it can give that 5% to 15% panel energy output efficiency improvement as well as heat the water to 70°C. This is a double benefit that's kind of a no-brainer if it can be made and installed economically. But it really shows what our sun is capable of when the correct set of technology is applied!
What if you use a heat pump system to move the energy from the heater water out on a pool water (basically a water-water heat pump) so then you send not just average temperature water to the solar panel but actually cooled down water like maybe at 10 degrees Celsius or lower. I think then you can gain even more than 15% in power production but it will be balanced out by the heat pump probably.
What if you don't put water on the photo cell itself so as not to distort the light wave landing onto the cells and reducing the power "creation" capacity? And cool the panel from the rear.
@@MR-backup you can expect somewhere between 10 and 15% improvement. Still not worth doing unless you also need the warm water for something like a pool.
@@MR-backup Hmm, got me thinking that maybe the solar panel can be manufactured with many thin channels embedded within backside plastic perhaps. It will just make the backside some 2mm thicker. That allows water to run just under the solar cell substrate and provide a guide for the water without requiring the use of any heat sink. These water channels would not be as efficient as an actual heatsink but would be a hell of a lot cheaper! Because these channels would not much more manufacturing materials -- just a small change to how the panel layers are sandwiched together at the factory. Each panel will need some sort of inlet and outlet water ports. The smaller channel size will require a stronger pump but still should be net positive in terms of energy production. 🤔
I went in 2015-2017 to a energy convention and there was a company who had solar panels with hoses at the backside. It had a couple of functions. It was to cool the solar panel and to heat the water for your pool, shower. Somehow I never saw it again as the idea sounded good.
They go more by the name of PVT panels PhotoVoltaic Thermal panels, or collectors. Maybe not exactly the same as you seen, but I reckon more or less. Haven't seen them much around either, and know little firsthand. But hope this at least helps Googling them a bit.
You can watercool the panel by making the backside watertight and pump water through it, and use that water in your heat tank or swimming pool heating. All in all, it's not worth the effort unless you really have a lot of difference between night and day, but the year itself is not changing that much. So if you do have cold nights, the heat is good for storage in a heat tank, and at night it keeps the temperature of the panels stable plus it lowers the amount of electricity needed to heat up cold water to 65+ celsius after it went through the heat tank. Be aware that you should either have cold water or hot water, but not in between due to legions disease that thrives between 20 and 60.
We have a buffer of 2000 liters that has it's temperature around 40 to 50 celsius during the entire summer but it's only for heat storage as the water that we actually use just flows through some copper pipes that are inside the buffer and the water simply absorbs the heat from the buffer without exchanging the water itself. Anyway, I don't think there are any bacteria in that water since during the winter that water sometimes reaches 85 degrees celsius when the heating is turned on.
It works really well in colder climates as the system only pumps the water into the panels during daylight hours and can be used to prevent snow from building up on the panels (via a separated small panel, charge controller, deep cycle batteries, and pump)
Sundrum Solar has modules that attach to back of conventional solar panels and then use that heat generated for hot water needs, can be swimming pool, car wash, hotels or space heating.
Thanks for sharing. I’ve been looking for a way to warm my pool while simultaneously adding electricity. I’ll check them out. If the water cooled panels are 10% more efficient, but cost 10% more it would be a wash. It may be cheaper to just add an extra panel or two.
@@thespencerowen I've never installed their product but I know they've done a number of projects and think it a very viable means to extract more energy from the sun while making PV panels more efficient due to the cooling provided by the system. If you're in an area that deals with snow it can also be used to melt snow covered panels.
I would reclaim the water at the bottom, run it down into a geothermal system, in the ground, then when the water cools, it's pumped back up to start the cycle again. Many other uses for that hot water, hot water storage tank for baths, etc.
Or move somewhere where you get free well water and hope the power needed to pump the water is much less tha nthe power gain :) In actuality, none of the above are a good idea. Solar panels are so cheap now that you should just over spec your system.
This is informative. I wonder if an internal cooling solution may yield even better results. Not only because the actual cells would be cooled but your also avoid any potential loss of sunlight hitting the cells due to the reflection and refraction from the water cascading down the glass. Might he something to consider for a future aide by side test.
I remember reading years ago (early 2000's) that solar panels were more efficient in slightly overcast days, I have no idea if it was accurate or not, but this would kind of back up the theory that the panels work better at a cooler temp. Either way pretty interesting to me, thanks for making and posting this.
Majority of the cooling is from water exaporating off the panel so this could probably be done with much less water at intervals. A supprisingly effectave way to cool your house when the ac cant keep up is to hose off your roof a few times throughout the day.
Sadly practicality trumps theory. Unless you have good quality distilled water, you'll have. Rapid scale buildup which will occlude panels rendering them useless. Your swamp cooler approach can work if done on the back side
@@shawnbrennan7526 if that is the case, wouldn't it be better to run copper water tubes on the back of the pannel, which is most likely a sheet of aluminum? That might conduct heat away from the internals more efficiently than running water over the glass.
Maybe you should recommend dual use panels. They harvest the heat with watercooling loops on the back of the panels. So you 1. cool your panels down to get a better efficiency (more Wh) and 2. You can harvest the warm water from the system via heat exchanger.This way you have not wasted any water and get the dual purpose use out of the sun energy
when i was getting my degree in this field, i met a guy that installs flat fin tubing on the back of panels and the water was cooling the panels and was used to generate heat through thermo heat generators, and some went to domestic use. the important thing to remember is to use as clean a water as you can if you are going to wet the panels to prevent degrading by mineral build up and water is a universal solvent and will destroy the frame over time
to be clear, efficiency increases below STC. The flow meter was a nice addition. One additional test would be periodic water flow. Save water and allows the water to evaporate, cooling the panels. This will depend on humidity which varies by day and region. Also, if the heated water could be used for things like swimming pool heating or hot water preheating, it gets a bit more cost effective. Water also block longer wavelengths of light (so red more than blue), so cooling the back of the panels might be more effective.
As a standalone fixture, the potential savings are probably offset by the water and power pumping it. However, if were done as a multifaceted system that is cleaning the panels (keeping pv efficiency ratio up), cooling the panel and also heating water for internal use, then the compounding effect could make it a more efficient and cost worthy approach. I think we'll see more cooling systems in future, as pv panels become more efficient and cost effective.
Off grid 20+ years and heat loss is an obvious factor you can mitigate. I don't recommend using water though and the way solar installers mitigate it is by adding additional panels to make up what is lost in high temperatures and on cloudy overcast days. However, for DIY solar I recommend not putting your panels on a roof that is black or dark as that will increase heat loss even more and use a ground mount system over dirt or light colored rock. You can also increase air flow to the back side of the panels by removing obstructions and if possible set them so the natural wind patterns flows across the panels. Even a light breeze makes a difference. A ground mount system with adjustable tilt and angle or a tracker is optimal. I also recommend a ground mount system so you can wash the dust and bird crap off your panels and check and do any maintenance needs. My system gets washed off a few times a week. My system is 1.4Kw ground mount with 600Ah LIFEPO4 batteries and Geneverse 200Ah and ALLPOWERS 200AH power station for extra capacity and that runs everything: water pump, lights, microwave, laptop, evap cooler, ebikes and recharges lots of tools and gadgets.
Have a capture system and directly put the reclaimed water back on the solar through a radiator in the shade with a fan and a pump you'd probably have to top it off cause of condensation and evaporation creating a loss you'll need to account for but could definitely work on super hot days
We can place finned heatsinks behind the panels and wet these heatsinks regularly with micro sprays. In this way, semi-passive cooling can be achieved by evaporation on the increased surface of the heatsinks with fins. If we ignore the heatsink cost, I think this will be the most viable solution that provides the highest efficiency... I love your videos, keep it up. Thanks.
Thank you for your valuable input. There is so much wrong to unpack here, I don't know if we will ever get it right before it's too late. 0*Installing a properly sized capacitor pack between the meterbase and main panel & soft start packs on ac units will greatly reduce the amount of in-rush power used & lower energy "consumption." 1*Kinetic energy is way cheaper & easier to produce 2*There is another type of panel that produces electricity even on cloudy day or when covered with snow 3*The entire landfill system could be eliminated, and garbage incinerators used to create steam to power generators & the smog output is filter ; rendering a carbon neutral pollution output and has other benefits. 4*Internal blade wind turbine technology has really come a long way. When it comes to mounting, what cosmeticly looks like a futuristic chimney stack to your rooftop, wind blows thru it, power comes out of it. Both day & night
That depends on the climate. Somewhere that gets large amounts of rain could capture plenty of rain to do this and then use the water for other purposes like watering a garden. The water doesn't have to simply be wasted.
@@kahingaltv2023Hi, think rain water harvesting, the panel becomes the means to capture the water. Using the tank water to cool the panel uses the rain water capture parts you already have. The big tank becomes the heat soak that gets liberated at night. Take care all M.
I have an Ecoflow Delta 2 and 2-HQST 190 watt panels. I purchased them in August of 2023. The panels are connected side-by-side and are rigged with 10in wheels and a sturdy PVC adjustable leg arrangement that can accommodate tilt-angle and azimuth all year long. I can move it around the yard as needed to dodge the shade of nearby trees to grab as much sun as is available. Later in the year, I was charging on a sunny but cooler day, what we call DELUXE weather in Florida. The Ecoflow app showed a whopping 400 watts, but only for a few seconds. It kept on charging in the low to mid-300 watt range. Now that it is 95° here, I’m getting no more than 300 watts and usually under that, in sunny weather. So, today, June 8, 2024, I recalled you experimenting with water to cool off a solar array; I gave it a shot. I was charging and getting a steady 263 watts with the panels grabbing the sun at the correct tilt angle and azimuth. I began watering at the top of the panels with a hand fan sprinkler, letting the water cascade down to the bottom. Within one minute the charge went from 263 watts to 313 watts and stayed there until I removed the sprinkler. The wattage slowly returned to 263. Armed with this knowledge, I might rig something up if and when we lose our power to a hurricane this season. (We've never lost water pressure in the past, only electricity.) That significant wattage increase may come in handy.
Yeah! I've noticed this in my van one day after it rained. Also, it's counterintuitive but my panel covers a ventilation vent in the van, and running the fan produces more power despite the fan load than not. One great use case for this is for an off grid tiny shack house with a single slope roof where nearly the entire roof is solar to block the sun. The water would keep the roof and shack cooler. In my case during those direct sun hours I'm running a 12v pump to filter rain water used for bathing, washing, cleaning and irrigation so might as well run it over the roof achieve this affect, which i think will also disinfect and heat the water.
Be careful with systems that only create warm but not hot water. The risk is that you might accidentally grow Legionella bacteria in the system, which can be pretty nasty if incorporated with vapor of a warm shower.
I not only have this set up for my 12.4K W backyard fence mounted system but I also have low pressure misters that clean my solar panel and pull my solar panels from 130° down to 88° increasing my total power production by 1200 W which is enough to run a small air conditioning unit. I also have a smaller version of a whole home water softener for lime scale.
I have a small array in my yard with a 200ah lifepo4 battery. I use this for my pool equipment, outdoor lighting and power tool charging. You video made me start thinking of a way I could use my pool pump and reclaim the water to heat the pool.
Nice video. I have 800w of ground mount Rich solar panels connected to an EcoFlow Pro and run the sprinkler in the heat of the day. I almost always get at least a 10% increase. It might be because I’m in Oklahoma and it’s 108 today 🤪. I checked my panels and even with water cooling they were 90+ degrees
People have been playing around with this idea since the 1980s! It is 100% impractical, but it does work! 😂 not a single commercial application of this idea has ever been implemented successfully. There is a warehouse north of Los Angeles that is stacked with gently used solar panels and you can pick up a 300 W module for about $40.
I've certainly noticed this. My array produces more power on cool sunny days than on hot sunny days. My highest production days are actually during the winter! Of course it helps a lot that it only snows for a few minutes per decade in San Diego. This is why you should never mount solar panels with their backs against something solid, unless it's a good heat exchanger. They need the air flow to cool the backs. I think spraying the backs might work better than spraying the glass because they are in better thermal contact with the silicon layers.
I'd say some improvements are from cooling and some of the improvements are from light magnification from water droplets. Cool test tho. I'd say cooling the back side of the panel would give you a better knowledge of cooling alone without magnifying light on the front side
I don't think there's any appreciable magnification here - you'd need light that'd miss the panels to hit the panels instead, and there's almost none in this setup. There should even be a detriment from additional reflections away from the panel, since the albedo of the panels seems to have gotten brighter in the video.
City water or well water would result in mineral buildup on the panels from evaporation, hard water stains, which would lower efficiency and ultimately become nearly impossible to clean off. Collected rain water or distilled water would be best. A system that carries away heat without evaporation of water would be best. Such panels are available.
good idea, to save on water cost, i would recommend recycling the water that you use for your panels. have a mechanism to collect and repump the water. i would use a solar powered water pump.
Apparently the temperature coefficient changes with the age of the panel because I have some 14 yo panels with extensive spider cracks that have degraded by about 10-15% at STC, (basically when it's cool out), but when they really heat up in the summer the power output crashes. It was a simple test I did when they were very hot I took a hose and hosed down the panels. I saw over a 40% rise in amperage on my Amprobe. There could have been some SMALL variations in solar input but the sky was clear that day. It was an eye opener for me.
You'll want to use demineralized water for this, like distilled water or harvested rain water. City or well water will most likely leave mineral buildup
Great video! You can also filter the water and pump it back through a heat exchanger. While not ideal, and it is more complex, there are ways to do this without using the water once and throwing it out.
@@Chris-yy7qc what are you optimizing for? Energy or water consumption? A ram pump can operate with 2-3 feet of head pressure. One might be able to build a self refilling system that requires no electricity. Or a pump that runs only to refill a reservoir intermittently, and use water height to drive the flow. Complex? Way to complex. Benefits? Not enough IMHO. But potentially still a net positive effect for the effort. Add a dedicated panel for the intermittent pump and you’re good. No battery, should stop running when the sun goes down anyway.
So if your a farmer irrigating your crop, you could set up your irrigator with solar panels to follow the Sun and drip water on crops as it moves across the field. Always been a fan of gardens and solar panels occupying the same land. Check out gardening with solar panels.
Thank you for all your efforts Scott, this video represents pretty much what YT *should be* about in my mind 🙂👍 A temp diff of almost 50% for a 5% gain in yield sounds pretty sobering to be honest. Even if this would vary up to 10%, will be it worth the extra investment for the required material, electricity (water pump) and the water itself, which will become a more valuable resource in the coming decades? BTW - have you observed a significant efficiency gain during winter then?
During the winter, your panels can make a huge amount of power because the panels and the conductors are cooler and can pump more current into your charge controller. In the dead of winter, it isn’t uncommon for us to have a week or two of -40
That's actually less of an improvement than I expected, but now that I think of it, cooling the outside of the glass isn't going to cool the solar cells by much due to glass being a pretty good insulator. Also, one risks cracking the glass. Generally speaking it isn't worth trying to cool the panels due to the extra complication. Easier to just add additional panel(s).
Tech ingredients already covered this issue 6 months ago. High temperatures also shorten the panels life, there is an Australian company making water cooled panels so that the panels make more power,improved life span and make hot water for home use. Tech ingredients in their panel experiment used fans behind the panel, so you arent blocking sunlight, they got better results.
and this person solved this issue 2 years ago. with a perfect water cooling system. With the 80 % increase in power also there is no waste of water. ua-cam.com/video/TZkvBLTbpyw/v-deo.html
"Combined heat and power" is so often an explicit benefit (steam from power plants at large scale, cars at small scale) that I'm surprised there aren't more systems doing it! I know water and electricity don't "mix" and it would be more complexity, but I would have thought all the puzzle pieces are already here given existing products like water-cooled CPU coolers. Must be missing something still.... 🤔
This is also why early in the morning you can have your charge controllers trip on over voltage if you string is close to the max on your charge controller.
i think the data is tainted due to the sprinkler tube being set up in a way that partially shaded the panel. i would say it needs to be rerun and setup in a way where each panel is equally shaded... 0% shaded. i like the experiment though, curious to know what the real results would be
I saw an idea trialed that used special double sided panels installed vertically, with the sides facing east and west. It missed the sun in the middle of the day, but overall generated more power by working more efficiently when it wasn’t as hot, and by increasing the number of effective hours by generating earlier in morning and later in evening. It would be fascinating to test this idea! Thanks for your vid - super interesting.
Very interesting test. It doesn’t seem though like it would be worth it long-term. The cost of running the water just doesn’t seem like it would outweigh the benefit of 5%. Now if you had a closed loop system where you had a way to naturally cool down the water (without some kind of conditioner running), and all you had to do was run a small pump, it might be worth it. Again, very cool test. Thanks for sharing it!
If you can Set-up a recycled water system which can be topped up by natures rainwater then you would have a constant Cooling System. Also I thought have a in-built mini fans under or in between the solar panels so that they are powered by the panels and thus coolinganother cooling down system.
It looked like the PVC was casting a thin shadow across the top of the panel. that will cause a big drop in efficiency. Ideally you would only need to use as much water as necessary to evaporate on the panel and not run off.
As a boater on a liveaboard boat, sailing from point A to point B.... floating "flexible" panels on the water not only provides all the "free" real-estate needed for a 4KW system, it cools the panels and makes them more efficient. When not in use, it is rolled up on a spool (like your garden hose) and stowed there for later use....
Try water catching larger pipe at bottom with water going through a small “radiator”, both in shade under panel. Then pump water back over panel in loop?
I am thinking through a coil on the backside of the panel to simulate a pool heater setup while trying to pull some heat out of the panel. Not sure how successful that will be but worth a shot.
Try a much slower drip rate. BTW it's really common in FL to have hybrid panels that channel pool water through the inside of a solar panel to both cool the panel and heat the pool.
Had a friend that did copper panel backing with water lines running through it to pull heat from the the solar panel back in 07 as a some form of Master thesis, find myself looking for that final document now. To compare Results. He used his to heat the hot water/warm the house come winter. Wish I had the money to do something like that with my house, but that would be fresh constructions I am pretty sure for my design.
Seems like it's just cheaper/simpler overall to just spend the money on more panels and do fixed tilt. Water has hard water deposits, fans would get wet and break/wear out, tilting 1-axis/2-axis is progressively more complex and costly.
I did this for a well! The array output is just higher than the well, but the high temperature reduced the output to 75-80%, which reduced well run time and increased battery load resulting in even less run time. With the cold well water, we were able to consistently reach 90%+ (got 108% once!) and the used water is plumbed into a tank for irigation. The only bad thing is I didn't even think about how the well produces hard water.
I have to wonder if there is a increase in power from the magnifying effects of the water and if having a mister would be more effective to increase power that way or creating a steady completely covering flow over the face of the panel would be more effective. Likely a full front of panel covering with water would be best as it would even out any magnification and provide the best cooling.
I had similar questions and if magnification doesn't help, maybe the mister should be on the back side of the panel so as to not disturb the sun's rays?
I love your videos. I’ve been researching a solar heater for my pool. It may be possible to combine the tubes from a solar header with panels to make a cooling system.
Off grid 20+ years and heat loss is an obvious factor you can mitigate. I don't recommend using water though and the way solar installers mitigate it is by adding additional panels to make up what is lost in high temperatures and on cloudy overcast days. However, for DIY solar I recommend not putting your panels on a roof that is black or dark as that will increase heat loss even more and use a ground mount system over dirt or light colored rock. You can also increase air flow to the back side of the panels by removing obstructions and if possible set them so the natural wind patterns flows across the panels. Even a light breeze makes a difference. A ground mount system with adjustable tilt and angle or a solar tracker is optimal. I also recommend a ground mount system so you can wash the dust and bird crap off your panels and check and do any maintenance needs. My system gets washed off a few times a week. My system is 1.4Kw ground mount with 600Ah LIFEPO4 batteries and Geneverse 200Ah and ALLPOWERS 200AH power station for extra capacity and that runs everything: water pump, lights, microwave, laptop, evap cooler, ebikes and recharges lots of tools and gadgets.
Use rain water, or distilled or reverse-osmosis (without a mineralization filter). Mineral build up on the panel won't be happy for solar efficiency. My water has enough minerals that it will turn splashed surfaces white in a few days. (e.g. around an outdoor water feature)
Or perhaps use micro misters onto the back side of the panel so that any deposits don't affect the solar efficiency - just reduce the cooling. It would also mean far lower water usage.
I was in between Phoenix and Tucson this summer driving past a huge solar farm. I can't imagine how much their losses are in that 115 deg sun. I also couldn't imagine trying to cool them either.
Yeah, this type of system pulling from city water would be a definite No Go. I think the most practical system are integrated circulation systems for heating pool water. So you save money on heating the water and also cool down the panels.
Thought on this. I could see if you catch your rain water and use it to do this. If you have solar on your roof the water gets sprayed down to your rain gutters. Rain gutters than move it to the holding tank to get sent back up to the system. On the other side of this you could blow out the pump if not enough water was caught. You would be making more power to run the pump. This don't sound like a terrible idea if someone does catch rain water.
there is already a similar solution by using some hygroscopic foam at the backside of the panels. This foam is taking up the moisture during the cool nights and releasing it during the hot day. By this evaporation a cooling efect of the panels is obtained.
I did a project on this effect in my heat and mass transfer class, the math behind it is very interesting but it's only a viable option at certain temperatures, I primarily studied the effects of wind on the efficiency
This video gives me the idea of using patio misters to cool my 6 100w panels. Misting systems are very cheap and use little water, interesting. Thanks for the idea!
This has been on the table for decades.... Powerlabs, Engineering with Rosie, ..... have done this. The major point is cost efficiency. No use cooling the panels if the cooling costs more than the additional power from the grid would. I have seen water and air cooled panels (backside cooled) that use the extracted heat for heating purposes, but all those systems don't work well if you can't dump the heat somewhere. Running water over the front might even redude the light input into the cell.
maybe a 5 gallon bucket, solar powered pump and fan with there own small panel to power them. rain gutter at bottom of solar panel to be cooled to collect the water and recirculate. Tech Ingredients had a video with fans on the under side of the solar panel that did help cool the panels and increase production. I think the fan set up with a mister instead of a stream of water may be better. Evaporation has a cooling effect. I use a mister on my ac and it lowers the amps , temp and run time of my equipment.
Here in California we can't afford the water. Mark Snyder Electric in San Diego is working on some kind of solar panel cooling system. I'm not sure how it works. I think he said the cooling would somehow create distilled water that can be used. (He put in our solar panels 21 years ago. We have a 3.5 KW system. We make more electricity in the year than what we use.)
@@everydaysolar, I was thinking something like that. Use it as a pool heater. Also, since you’re providing cooling, you could process more sunlight per panel, so you could use mirrors to reflect more sunlight onto fewer panels. Or maybe lenses on a box with smaller water cooled solar panels in the box.
Nice video and info but I think you will find 59F is closer to 15C not 33C. I can see with a roof with water capture that the loss of water could be minimised outside of evaporation and that with enough hot days, solar on hand or a separate solar pump perhaps this still makes sense. Simplified with a sprinkler or misting system perhaps both cost and installation time could also be reduced.
this will work on moutain areas where plenty of water fall exists . you just have to install all the solar panel by the water fall & direct a small amount of water toward the panels . many mountain villages got no power so it can work for them not for flat landers.
Too much water is impairing the sunlight's ability to reach the solar panel. One of water's most significant properties is that it takes a lot of energy to heat it, and therefore very little water is needed in this application. You could also capture the water and recycle with a fish tank pump or similar.
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the company DualSun has a panel that can take in pool water to heat the pool while cooling the panels. If no pool, they can also be used to preheat water for your water heaters or go to any heat exchanger. It's a pretty cool system.
Was just about to mention them; currently planning to use some of those, and send the heat to a geothermal well that will provide heat for my house in the winter.
I always wondered if you could do some sort of micro-thermopile array setup on the back of a panel to generate useful power and cool the panel.
As soon as I saw the title I was thinking, combination solar thermal and pv is the ideal panel.
I hope the pun was intended.
What about all the bird and bat shit! Do they filter that out before you swim or shower in the run-off water?
I prevent my panels from getting too hot by keeping them in the shade.
Genius! 😂
😂😂
Even better if you keep them indoors
lmfao 🤣 nice one
Good luck with the power gain.
Being in a desert area I can't do the water idea but I did put a fan under one of my panels and got a better watt hour return than without the fan. Just moving air on the underside helped a lot!
If you ever get more panels in the future you might consider closed loop water cooling. I believe the panels need to be purpose built for it, but there's (almost) no water loss in closed loop systems and you can use the waste heat in the water to heat other things.
@@Mr_Soleomaybe putting it in a hot water tank that can then be used for heating at night
Dang... so essentially the cooling made it so you got more wattage per hour, more than enough to also power the fan? that's awesome if so. so basically the only cost was the fan. my next question would be how long until the fan is paid off?
a slightly hacky thing you could try is to stick old computer cpu cooling fins to the back of the pannel to move more of the heat from the pannel to the air
@@crestfallensunbro6001 so have a heatsink and a fan to cool it off, would definitely work
Instead of pouring lots of cold water on the panels, you could try to spray a little mist. Then water evaporating would cool the panels with minimal water consumption.
I was thinking the same thing… misters are great as they really don’t use a lot of water… most people think they are wasting water, but refuse to switch to composting toilets… but, whatever
And spray it on the backside, putting it on the front blocking the sun is just stupid...
no reason you have to letting the water just runoff into the ground. Assuming a roof mount system run the water over the panels, it drains into the gutter. downspout flows into a catch barrel with a small pump that sends the water back up over the panels. install a float switch in the barrle that adds tap water if the level drops below whatever minimum amount you need for the pump. Assuming you reduce leaks going elsewhere it shouldn't be any more water loss than you'd have from a mister evaporation. The main question is does the power gains outweigh the energy usage of the recirculating pump.
@@a64738 light passes through water..... you just blow in from stupid town?
Water pour also works double as dust sweepers. Kinda matter in sandy and dusty area. Lower the maintenance cost to sweep them off.
The problem is less the water, since you can simply capture it with a rainwater harvesting system and re-use it. The question is if you gain more power than you need to have a pump running all day. Maybe it helps if you just turn the pump on for about 20 seconds every minute, but that might drastically reduce the lifespan of the pump and might leave your panels covered in mineral residue left by the evaporating water.
There's actually a "starts per hour" rating for larger motors, but I wouldn't expect it to apply here. But if it becomes an issue then a soft start for the motor would be the way to go. And there are other ways to cool off the panels without running water over the glass on the panel (think water cooling found on PCs), such as a closed loop system that heats your water for home use by way of a heat exchanger.
Now would these modifications be worth doing? Single use water dripping across the top of the panels would be a horrible use of water, and probably (hopefully) illegal in most places.
A closed loop system that circulates captured coolant (antifreeze) and the dumps the heat into something that you want heated (hot water heater, pool, heating the house, etc), as a secondary use, or if you don't need the heat, sinking the heat into the soil would be far more efficient, and potentially reduce your energy costs in other areas of your home.
I don't think that I would do it for a meager 5% electrical gain. I would have so see a marked improvement in energy production as well as a cost savings in the secondary uses.
@@MrWaalkman I think the same way. Was also thinking of a liquid cooling loop like the one used for PC's. It could be applied to the back of the panels using heat transfer paste (like the one used on CPU's). But 5% is just not worth the time and money.
Another possible option on tilt roofs could be to capture wind from the line along the top of the roof and get it to blow under the panels. But It would only work when there is enough wind... and if there is too much wind it might get your panels airborne (if unlucky along with the roof)
The water is the less efficient way to address the problem. There are companies that are bonding heatsinks on the back of the PV cells and 'stealing' power from the cells to run wash-down fans controlled by a simple thermal diode. ua-cam.com/video/Mt9qLRN7JvA/v-deo.html Tech Ingredients did a breakdown of it, and discussed using water briefly, but dismissed it mainly because a pump is a lot more power intensive to run, and the net effect is only about 5-7% where the heatsink and fan arrangement was 10-12% for a smaller power investment.
I'd give that a look because the discussion is a bit more in-depth.
Try putting a duct on the back of the panel that runs air up via convection through heat sink fins.
@@TheCablebill That's what @kmikl mentioned in the last comment before yours.
I am so glad it is only 5% and we all not have to waste water to cool every single panel. Thanx for your work.
just imagine in california
middle of a years long drought
they're pouring water over their solar panels for a 5% power gain.
the streets are muddy, nearly flooded.
the liberal influencers are ranting about how the 5% power gain is "good for the environment".
and the california government is taxing you on every mile you drive down those flooded, soot-filled roads.
you don't have to waste it, you can repurpose 95% of the water that goes down so that it goes directly to trees/plants to water them, or you can collect it in water tanks.
also the system would only run during hot hours by using a thermostat, so it never wastes water during the night or when the temperature is already cooler.
@@wearebacteria Or you could make a closed radiator system
@Gatitasecsii that's my plan. I'm also adding heat in winter with a cheap desal heater.
Thanks for making this excellent comparison. One cooling option is to use thermal conductive glue to attach aluminum heat sinks to the back of the panel. You could even hook up a separate solar powered fan to draw air over the heat sinks.
Yeah, that has some potential. Thanks for the idea. Increasing the shaded surface area with a little airflow would probably make a measurable difference. Sounds like I need to go shop for some aluminum 😁
@@everydaysolar The cost over gain would be enormous.
I think @TechIngredients did a aluminum cooler on the back with net positive output like that.
@@SkinnaMovTechingredients is the bomb!!
Would not want to cover the back of the panel, with bifacial panels. But have a creek 100 ft away solar pump would work.
Thanks for doing the test. I think the 5% extra energy production seems low and probably will scale up to more if done over a home sized array of 2000+ watts. I've hosed down a solar arrays in the middle of the day and noticed upwards 10% power increase on just the watt output.
But, in addition to using up a lot of water, a big problem with is *hard water* stains on the panel's glass from using normal city tap water. Those minerals will get _baked in_ even harder with the intense daily UV and heating. Personal experience.
As someone else mentioned, this can only be practical with a heat sink system on the back of the panel:
(a) no hard water stains
(b) low to zero water waste as water is circulated
Requires a lot more materials like hosing, valve, heatsink, anti-bacterial additives, etc. If its going to give 10% energy gain then might as well spend 10% more on panels and spend less money and time. The ever falling prices of solar panels makes that the best alternative to get more energy output.
However...
I do like this idea of having a substantial behind-the-panel cooling system that would also save the heated water to a solar tank. That way, the house is getting much more energy efficiency from solar panels well beyond the ~21% efficiency of the latest generation solar panels.
Look up "2-in1 DualSun SPRING hybrid panel" that has all the heatsink and hosing built into each panel. The manufacturer claims it can give that 5% to 15% panel energy output efficiency improvement as well as heat the water to 70°C. This is a double benefit that's kind of a no-brainer if it can be made and installed economically. But it really shows what our sun is capable of when the correct set of technology is applied!
What if you use a heat pump system to move the energy from the heater water out on a pool water (basically a water-water heat pump) so then you send not just average temperature water to the solar panel but actually cooled down water like maybe at 10 degrees Celsius or lower. I think then you can gain even more than 15% in power production but it will be balanced out by the heat pump probably.
What if you don't put water on the photo cell itself so as not to distort the light wave landing onto the cells and reducing the power "creation" capacity? And cool the panel from the rear.
@@MR-backup you can expect somewhere between 10 and 15% improvement. Still not worth doing unless you also need the warm water for something like a pool.
@@alexandruilea915 Interesting idea. Can someone do the calculations please! 😁
@@MR-backup Hmm, got me thinking that maybe the solar panel can be manufactured with many thin channels embedded within backside plastic perhaps. It will just make the backside some 2mm thicker.
That allows water to run just under the solar cell substrate and provide a guide for the water without requiring the use of any heat sink.
These water channels would not be as efficient as an actual heatsink but would be a hell of a lot cheaper! Because these channels would not much more manufacturing materials -- just a small change to how the panel layers are sandwiched together at the factory.
Each panel will need some sort of inlet and outlet water ports. The smaller channel size will require a stronger pump but still should be net positive in terms of energy production. 🤔
I went in 2015-2017 to a energy convention and there was a company who had solar panels with hoses at the backside.
It had a couple of functions.
It was to cool the solar panel and to heat the water for your pool, shower.
Somehow I never saw it again as the idea sounded good.
They go more by the name of PVT panels PhotoVoltaic Thermal panels, or collectors. Maybe not exactly the same as you seen, but I reckon more or less. Haven't seen them much around either, and know little firsthand. But hope this at least helps Googling them a bit.
You can watercool the panel by making the backside watertight and pump water through it, and use that water in your heat tank or swimming pool heating.
All in all, it's not worth the effort unless you really have a lot of difference between night and day, but the year itself is not changing that much. So if you do have cold nights, the heat is good for storage in a heat tank, and at night it keeps the temperature of the panels stable plus it lowers the amount of electricity needed to heat up cold water to 65+ celsius after it went through the heat tank. Be aware that you should either have cold water or hot water, but not in between due to legions disease that thrives between 20 and 60.
We have a buffer of 2000 liters that has it's temperature around 40 to 50 celsius during the entire summer but it's only for heat storage as the water that we actually use just flows through some copper pipes that are inside the buffer and the water simply absorbs the heat from the buffer without exchanging the water itself. Anyway, I don't think there are any bacteria in that water since during the winter that water sometimes reaches 85 degrees celsius when the heating is turned on.
It works really well in colder climates as the system only pumps the water into the panels during daylight hours and can be used to prevent snow from building up on the panels (via a separated small panel, charge controller, deep cycle batteries, and pump)
Sundrum Solar has modules that attach to back of conventional solar panels and then use that heat generated for hot water needs, can be swimming pool, car wash, hotels or space heating.
Thanks for sharing. I’ve been looking for a way to warm my pool while simultaneously adding electricity. I’ll check them out.
If the water cooled panels are 10% more efficient, but cost 10% more it would be a wash. It may be cheaper to just add an extra panel or two.
@@thespencerowen I've never installed their product but I know they've done a number of projects and think it a very viable means to extract more energy from the sun while making PV panels more efficient due to the cooling provided by the system. If you're in an area that deals with snow it can also be used to melt snow covered panels.
omg thank you for showing both Celsius and Fahrenheit scales. much appreciated effort
I love it when videos do this cause sometimes the content seems like it caters just one global area.
I would reclaim the water at the bottom, run it down into a geothermal system, in the ground, then when the water cools, it's pumped back up to start the cycle again. Many other uses for that hot water, hot water storage tank for baths, etc.
throw on a windmill battery charger for the pump and youve got free energy
The energy u need for that is higher than the profit gained from cooling.
@@lenardgor boy go on somewhere and study
People who act like a small pump uses significant amounts of energy probably yell at their kids for leaving LED bulbs on when nobody is home.
Or move somewhere where you get free well water and hope the power needed to pump the water is much less tha nthe power gain :) In actuality, none of the above are a good idea. Solar panels are so cheap now that you should just over spec your system.
This is informative. I wonder if an internal cooling solution may yield even better results. Not only because the actual cells would be cooled but your also avoid any potential loss of sunlight hitting the cells due to the reflection and refraction from the water cascading down the glass.
Might he something to consider for a future aide by side test.
There are panels that have cooling on the back side. Google DualSun Spring.
I remember reading years ago (early 2000's) that solar panels were more efficient in slightly overcast days, I have no idea if it was accurate or not, but this would kind of back up the theory that the panels work better at a cooler temp. Either way pretty interesting to me, thanks for making and posting this.
Basically sometimes a cloudy day will magnify the suns rays through the light moist cloud particles
Majority of the cooling is from water exaporating off the panel so this could probably be done with much less water at intervals. A supprisingly effectave way to cool your house when the ac cant keep up is to hose off your roof a few times throughout the day.
Sadly practicality trumps theory. Unless you have good quality distilled water, you'll have. Rapid scale buildup which will occlude panels rendering them useless.
Your swamp cooler approach can work if done on the back side
I’d say more cooling is from conduction (panel to water) than from evaporation in this test.
@@shawnbrennan7526 if that is the case, wouldn't it be better to run copper water tubes on the back of the pannel, which is most likely a sheet of aluminum? That might conduct heat away from the internals more efficiently than running water over the glass.
Maybe you should recommend dual use panels. They harvest the heat with watercooling loops on the back of the panels. So you 1. cool your panels down to get a better efficiency (more Wh) and 2. You can harvest the warm water from the system via heat exchanger.This way you have not wasted any water and get the dual purpose use out of the sun energy
when i was getting my degree in this field, i met a guy that installs flat fin tubing on the back of panels and the water was cooling the panels and was used to generate heat through thermo heat generators, and some went to domestic use.
the important thing to remember is to use as clean a water as you can if you are going to wet the panels to prevent degrading by mineral build up and water is a universal solvent and will destroy the frame over time
to be clear, efficiency increases below STC. The flow meter was a nice addition. One additional test would be periodic water flow. Save water and allows the water to evaporate, cooling the panels. This will depend on humidity which varies by day and region. Also, if the heated water could be used for things like swimming pool heating or hot water preheating, it gets a bit more cost effective. Water also block longer wavelengths of light (so red more than blue), so cooling the back of the panels might be more effective.
As a standalone fixture, the potential savings are probably offset by the water and power pumping it. However, if were done as a multifaceted system that is cleaning the panels (keeping pv efficiency ratio up), cooling the panel and also heating water for internal use, then the compounding effect could make it a more efficient and cost worthy approach. I think we'll see more cooling systems in future, as pv panels become more efficient and cost effective.
Off grid 20+ years and heat loss is an obvious factor you can mitigate. I don't recommend using water though and the way solar installers mitigate it is by adding additional panels to make up what is lost in high temperatures and on cloudy overcast days.
However, for DIY solar I recommend not putting your panels on a roof that is black or dark as that will increase heat loss even more and use a ground mount system over dirt or light colored rock. You can also increase air flow to the back side of the panels by removing obstructions and if possible set them so the natural wind patterns flows across the panels. Even a light breeze makes a difference.
A ground mount system with adjustable tilt and angle or a tracker is optimal.
I also recommend a ground mount system so you can wash the dust and bird crap off your panels and check and do any maintenance needs. My system gets washed off a few times a week.
My system is 1.4Kw ground mount with 600Ah LIFEPO4 batteries and Geneverse 200Ah and ALLPOWERS 200AH power station for extra capacity and that runs everything: water pump, lights, microwave, laptop, evap cooler, ebikes and recharges lots of tools and gadgets.
Have a capture system and directly put the reclaimed water back on the solar through a radiator in the shade with a fan and a pump you'd probably have to top it off cause of condensation and evaporation creating a loss you'll need to account for but could definitely work on super hot days
We can place finned heatsinks behind the panels and wet these heatsinks regularly with micro sprays. In this way, semi-passive cooling can be achieved by evaporation on the increased surface of the heatsinks with fins. If we ignore the heatsink cost, I think this will be the most viable solution that provides the highest efficiency... I love your videos, keep it up. Thanks.
"My current power bill" . . . I see what you did there ;-)
Thank you for your valuable input. There is so much wrong to unpack here, I don't know if we will ever get it right before it's too late.
0*Installing a properly sized capacitor pack between the meterbase and main panel & soft start packs on ac units will greatly reduce the amount of in-rush power used & lower energy "consumption."
1*Kinetic energy is way cheaper & easier to produce
2*There is another type of panel that produces electricity even on cloudy day or when covered with snow
3*The entire landfill system could be eliminated, and garbage incinerators used to create steam to power generators & the smog output is filter ; rendering a carbon neutral pollution output and has other benefits.
4*Internal blade wind turbine technology has really come a long way. When it comes to mounting, what cosmeticly looks like a futuristic chimney stack to your rooftop, wind blows thru it, power comes out of it. Both day & night
there's no way the extra 5% justifies the cost/waste of the water. Thanks for the video!
For sure
That depends on the climate. Somewhere that gets large amounts of rain could capture plenty of rain to do this and then use the water for other purposes like watering a garden. The water doesn't have to simply be wasted.
then use your brain, make pan that captures the water then cycle it back..
@@kahingaltv2023 it’s not worth it. But feel free to do it with your gigantic brain
@@kahingaltv2023Hi, think rain water harvesting, the panel becomes the means to capture the water. Using the tank water to cool the panel uses the rain water capture parts you already have. The big tank becomes the heat soak that gets liberated at night.
Take care all M.
I have an Ecoflow Delta 2 and 2-HQST 190 watt panels. I purchased them in August of 2023. The panels are connected side-by-side and are rigged with 10in wheels and a sturdy PVC adjustable leg arrangement that can accommodate tilt-angle and azimuth all year long. I can move it around the yard as needed to dodge the shade of nearby trees to grab as much sun as is available.
Later in the year, I was charging on a sunny but cooler day, what we call DELUXE weather in Florida. The Ecoflow app showed a whopping 400 watts, but only for a few seconds. It kept on charging in the low to mid-300 watt range. Now that it is 95° here, I’m getting no more than 300 watts and usually under that, in sunny weather.
So, today, June 8, 2024, I recalled you experimenting with water to cool off a solar array; I gave it a shot. I was charging and getting a steady 263 watts with the panels grabbing the sun at the correct tilt angle and azimuth. I began watering at the top of the panels with a hand fan sprinkler, letting the water cascade down to the bottom. Within one minute the charge went from 263 watts to 313 watts and stayed there until I removed the sprinkler. The wattage slowly returned to 263. Armed with this knowledge, I might rig something up if and when we lose our power to a hurricane this season. (We've never lost water pressure in the past, only electricity.) That significant wattage increase may come in handy.
Yeah! I've noticed this in my van one day after it rained. Also, it's counterintuitive but my panel covers a ventilation vent in the van, and running the fan produces more power despite the fan load than not.
One great use case for this is for an off grid tiny shack house with a single slope roof where nearly the entire roof is solar to block the sun. The water would keep the roof and shack cooler. In my case during those direct sun hours I'm running a 12v pump to filter rain water used for bathing, washing, cleaning and irrigation so might as well run it over the roof achieve this affect, which i think will also disinfect and heat the water.
Be careful with systems that only create warm but not hot water.
The risk is that you might accidentally grow Legionella bacteria in the system, which can be pretty nasty if incorporated with vapor of a warm shower.
I not only have this set up for my 12.4K W backyard fence mounted system but I also have low pressure misters that clean my solar panel and pull my solar panels from 130° down to 88° increasing my total power production by 1200 W which is enough to run a small air conditioning unit.
I also have a smaller version of a whole home water softener for lime scale.
I have a small array in my yard with a 200ah lifepo4 battery. I use this for my pool equipment, outdoor lighting and power tool charging. You video made me start thinking of a way I could use my pool pump and reclaim the water to heat the pool.
Nice video. I have 800w of ground mount Rich solar panels connected to an EcoFlow Pro and run the sprinkler in the heat of the day. I almost always get at least a 10% increase. It might be because I’m in Oklahoma and it’s 108 today 🤪. I checked my panels and even with water cooling they were 90+ degrees
Please stay inside. 108 is more than boiling point of water!!
i think he means 108F, America is in Fahrenheit not Celsius.
People have been playing around with this idea since the 1980s! It is 100% impractical, but it does work! 😂 not a single commercial application of this idea has ever been implemented successfully. There is a warehouse north of Los Angeles that is stacked with gently used solar panels and you can pick up a 300 W module for about $40.
I've certainly noticed this. My array produces more power on cool sunny days than on hot sunny days. My highest production days are actually during the winter! Of course it helps a lot that it only snows for a few minutes per decade in San Diego. This is why you should never mount solar panels with their backs against something solid, unless it's a good heat exchanger. They need the air flow to cool the backs. I think spraying the backs might work better than spraying the glass because they are in better thermal contact with the silicon layers.
59 degrees F is about 15 C. You forgot to subtract 32 before 5/9! Love the everyday home stuff!
I'd say some improvements are from cooling and some of the improvements are from light magnification from water droplets. Cool test tho. I'd say cooling the back side of the panel would give you a better knowledge of cooling alone without magnifying light on the front side
I don't think there's any appreciable magnification here - you'd need light that'd miss the panels to hit the panels instead, and there's almost none in this setup. There should even be a detriment from additional reflections away from the panel, since the albedo of the panels seems to have gotten brighter in the video.
@@AySz88 If anything the water is probably diffusing/scattering the light waves away from the panel
I really appreciated that you started with a control verification.
City water or well water would result in mineral buildup on the panels from evaporation, hard water stains, which would lower efficiency and ultimately become nearly impossible to clean off. Collected rain water or distilled water would be best. A system that carries away heat without evaporation of water would be best. Such panels are available.
I've run a large water reserve through those pool-heater panels to preserve low temps during peak loads, and a single panel running a refrigerant.
If the mini power meters are not calibrated, you may need to swap their positions to convince both read the same manner.
I was thinking of just adding a few of those thermal electric generator things to the back of a solar panels
Could be a great way to increase power
You could collect rain water, filter with a sand/charcoal. And use a small solar water pump to cycle the water… might do this for my solar shed 😁
good idea, to save on water cost, i would recommend recycling the water that you use for your panels. have a mechanism to collect and repump the water. i would use a solar powered water pump.
Apparently the temperature coefficient changes with the age of the panel because I have some 14 yo panels with extensive spider cracks that have degraded by about 10-15% at STC, (basically when it's cool out), but when they really heat up in the summer the power output crashes. It was a simple test I did when they were very hot I took a hose and hosed down the panels. I saw over a 40% rise in amperage on my Amprobe. There could have been some SMALL variations in solar input but the sky was clear that day. It was an eye opener for me.
You'll want to use demineralized water for this, like distilled water or harvested rain water. City or well water will most likely leave mineral buildup
Wouldn't that be covered under the panel manufacturers guarantee? If your panels had a quarantee.
@@michaelpinkston4628 Not when the manufacturer is out of business.
I wish they made a sizing planner for more than just homes. Motorhomes, mobile homes, standalone grids in the yard, etc.
We are going to start working on calculators at our site www.everydaysolar.com so thanks for the feedback!
Great video! You can also filter the water and pump it back through a heat exchanger. While not ideal, and it is more complex, there are ways to do this without using the water once and throwing it out.
Doesnt make sense. The pump would consume more than the 20 W / hr per Panel.
@@Chris-yy7qc what are you optimizing for? Energy or water consumption?
A ram pump can operate with 2-3 feet of head pressure. One might be able to build a self refilling system that requires no electricity. Or a pump that runs only to refill a reservoir intermittently, and use water height to drive the flow.
Complex? Way to complex. Benefits? Not enough IMHO. But potentially still a net positive effect for the effort.
Add a dedicated panel for the intermittent pump and you’re good. No battery, should stop running when the sun goes down anyway.
So if your a farmer irrigating your crop, you could set up your irrigator with solar panels to follow the Sun and drip water on crops as it moves across the field. Always been a fan of gardens and solar panels occupying the same land. Check out gardening with solar panels.
Thank you for all your efforts Scott, this video represents pretty much what YT *should be* about in my mind 🙂👍 A temp diff of almost 50% for a 5% gain in yield sounds pretty sobering to be honest. Even if this would vary up to 10%, will be it worth the extra investment for the required material, electricity (water pump) and the water itself, which will become a more valuable resource in the coming decades? BTW - have you observed a significant efficiency gain during winter then?
During the winter, your panels can make a huge amount of power because the panels and the conductors are cooler and can pump more current into your charge controller. In the dead of winter, it isn’t uncommon for us to have a week or two of -40
That's actually less of an improvement than I expected, but now that I think of it, cooling the outside of the glass isn't going to cool the solar cells by much due to glass being a pretty good insulator. Also, one risks cracking the glass. Generally speaking it isn't worth trying to cool the panels due to the extra complication. Easier to just add additional panel(s).
Tech ingredients already covered this issue 6 months ago. High temperatures also shorten the panels life, there is an Australian company making water cooled panels so that the panels make more power,improved life span and make hot water for home use. Tech ingredients in their panel experiment used fans behind the panel, so you arent blocking sunlight, they got better results.
and this person solved this issue 2 years ago. with a perfect water cooling system. With the 80 % increase in power also there is no waste of water.
ua-cam.com/video/TZkvBLTbpyw/v-deo.html
Water drops may also locally concentrate sunlight to a very small area, etching the silicon of the panel.
Can't wait to see until someone makes a proper Hybrid solar PV and Hot water setup to take that heat and use it for hot water in the house.
"Combined heat and power" is so often an explicit benefit (steam from power plants at large scale, cars at small scale) that I'm surprised there aren't more systems doing it! I know water and electricity don't "mix" and it would be more complexity, but I would have thought all the puzzle pieces are already here given existing products like water-cooled CPU coolers. Must be missing something still.... 🤔
This is also why early in the morning you can have your charge controllers trip on over voltage if you string is close to the max on your charge controller.
extremely interesting love the enthusiasim on solar
i think the data is tainted due to the sprinkler tube being set up in a way that partially shaded the panel. i would say it needs to be rerun and setup in a way where each panel is equally shaded... 0% shaded.
i like the experiment though, curious to know what the real results would be
I saw an idea trialed that used special double sided panels installed vertically, with the sides facing east and west. It missed the sun in the middle of the day, but overall generated more power by working more efficiently when it wasn’t as hot, and by increasing the number of effective hours by generating earlier in morning and later in evening. It would be fascinating to test this idea!
Thanks for your vid - super interesting.
Very interesting test. It doesn’t seem though like it would be worth it long-term. The cost of running the water just doesn’t seem like it would outweigh the benefit of 5%. Now if you had a closed loop system where you had a way to naturally cool down the water (without some kind of conditioner running), and all you had to do was run a small pump, it might be worth it.
Again, very cool test. Thanks for sharing it!
I wonder about how to circulate the water to make it a closed loop. You could do a geothermal style loop and dump the heat into the ground.
If you can Set-up a recycled water system which can be topped up by natures rainwater then you would have a constant Cooling System.
Also I thought have a in-built mini fans under or in between the solar panels so that they are powered by the panels and thus coolinganother cooling down system.
It looked like the PVC was casting a thin shadow across the top of the panel. that will cause a big drop in efficiency. Ideally you would only need to use as much water as necessary to evaporate on the panel and not run off.
As a boater on a liveaboard boat, sailing from point A to point B.... floating "flexible" panels on the water not only provides all the "free" real-estate needed for a 4KW system, it cools the panels and makes them more efficient. When not in use, it is rolled up on a spool (like your garden hose) and stowed there for later use....
Actually a negative power loss if you (should) distill your water to prevent lime buildup on your panels.
Try water catching larger pipe at bottom with water going through a small “radiator”, both in shade under panel. Then pump water back over panel in loop?
I am thinking through a coil on the backside of the panel to simulate a pool heater setup while trying to pull some heat out of the panel. Not sure how successful that will be but worth a shot.
Try a much slower drip rate.
BTW it's really common in FL to have hybrid panels that channel pool water through the inside of a solar panel to both cool the panel and heat the pool.
Had a friend that did copper panel backing with water lines running through it to pull heat from the the solar panel back in 07 as a some form of Master thesis, find myself looking for that final document now. To compare Results. He used his to heat the hot water/warm the house come winter. Wish I had the money to do something like that with my house, but that would be fresh constructions I am pretty sure for my design.
100 gallons of water for 20 watts? Also good luck with that Cybertruck, you'll need it.
if you set a collection system under the pannel, and then cycle it again through a small radiator for cooling the water, i think it’s worth it
if you set a collection system under the pannel, and then cycle it again through a small radiator for cooling the water, i think it’s worth it
Seems like it's just cheaper/simpler overall to just spend the money on more panels and do fixed tilt. Water has hard water deposits, fans would get wet and break/wear out, tilting 1-axis/2-axis is progressively more complex and costly.
Enhancement would be to swap the watering system to the other panel to nullify any panel performance discrepancies.
Great, that's why floating panels are great.
Could you please try the same experiment cooling down the bottom side?
I've also seen a ton of improvement when I have cloud lensing. Usually about an extra 10% improvement.
Yes but it's generally infrequent and brief meaning the energy (not power) gain is minimal.
one guy did a flat rear cover then cut long opening on the bottom and put 3 120mm fans on the top. this seems to work amazingly
I wonder what would happen if you just attached black radiator fins to the back of the panel? Passive systems are always the best if you can.
I did this for a well! The array output is just higher than the well, but the high temperature reduced the output to 75-80%, which reduced well run time and increased battery load resulting in even less run time.
With the cold well water, we were able to consistently reach 90%+ (got 108% once!) and the used water is plumbed into a tank for irigation.
The only bad thing is I didn't even think about how the well produces hard water.
I have to wonder if there is a increase in power from the magnifying effects of the water and if having a mister would be more effective to increase power that way or creating a steady completely covering flow over the face of the panel would be more effective. Likely a full front of panel covering with water would be best as it would even out any magnification and provide the best cooling.
I had similar questions and if magnification doesn't help, maybe the mister should be on the back side of the panel so as to not disturb the sun's rays?
Gain because of cooling and extra reflection from the water, cool😃
I love your videos.
I’ve been researching a solar heater for my pool. It may be possible to combine the tubes from a solar header with panels to make a cooling system.
Off grid 20+ years and heat loss is an obvious factor you can mitigate. I don't recommend using water though and the way solar installers mitigate it is by adding additional panels to make up what is lost in high temperatures and on cloudy overcast days.
However, for DIY solar I recommend not putting your panels on a roof that is black or dark as that will increase heat loss even more and use a ground mount system over dirt or light colored rock. You can also increase air flow to the back side of the panels by removing obstructions and if possible set them so the natural wind patterns flows across the panels. Even a light breeze makes a difference.
A ground mount system with adjustable tilt and angle or a solar tracker is optimal.
I also recommend a ground mount system so you can wash the dust and bird crap off your panels and check and do any maintenance needs. My system gets washed off a few times a week.
My system is 1.4Kw ground mount with 600Ah LIFEPO4 batteries and Geneverse 200Ah and ALLPOWERS 200AH power station for extra capacity and that runs everything: water pump, lights, microwave, laptop, evap cooler, ebikes and recharges lots of tools and gadgets.
Use rain water, or distilled or reverse-osmosis (without a mineralization filter). Mineral build up on the panel won't be happy for solar efficiency. My water has enough minerals that it will turn splashed surfaces white in a few days. (e.g. around an outdoor water feature)
Or perhaps use micro misters onto the back side of the panel so that any deposits don't affect the solar efficiency - just reduce the cooling. It would also mean far lower water usage.
I was in between Phoenix and Tucson this summer driving past a huge solar farm. I can't imagine how much their losses are in that 115 deg sun. I also couldn't imagine trying to cool them either.
I suppose with that sort of sun it's easier to just add more panels.
Failed to include the cost of the water for the minimal gain. My water bill is routinely much higher than electric.
Yeah, this type of system pulling from city water would be a definite No Go. I think the most practical system are integrated circulation systems for heating pool water. So you save money on heating the water and also cool down the panels.
The cost for the electricity on the pump will instantly wipe out any gains. What a daft idea….
@@willsta21 not if you need to pay for electricity to heat pool water anyway.
Thought on this. I could see if you catch your rain water and use it to do this. If you have solar on your roof the water gets sprayed down to your rain gutters. Rain gutters than move it to the holding tank to get sent back up to the system. On the other side of this you could blow out the pump if not enough water was caught. You would be making more power to run the pump. This don't sound like a terrible idea if someone does catch rain water.
What if the water recirculates?
there is already a similar solution by using some hygroscopic foam at the backside of the panels. This foam is taking up the moisture during the cool nights and releasing it during the hot day. By this evaporation a cooling efect of the panels is obtained.
better filter those calcium.
its why the SOLAR panels are more efficient in the winter with colder conditions
It would be ridiculous to do that. Buy another panel
I did a project on this effect in my heat and mass transfer class, the math behind it is very interesting but it's only a viable option at certain temperatures, I primarily studied the effects of wind on the efficiency
This video gives me the idea of using patio misters to cool my 6 100w panels. Misting systems are very cheap and use little water, interesting. Thanks for the idea!
Such an interesting way to increase your power generation
This has been on the table for decades.... Powerlabs, Engineering with Rosie, ..... have done this. The major point is cost efficiency. No use cooling the panels if the cooling costs more than the additional power from the grid would. I have seen water and air cooled panels (backside cooled) that use the extracted heat for heating purposes, but all those systems don't work well if you can't dump the heat somewhere. Running water over the front might even redude the light input into the cell.
maybe a 5 gallon bucket, solar powered pump and fan with there own small panel to power them. rain gutter at bottom of solar panel to be cooled to collect the water and recirculate. Tech Ingredients had a video with fans on the under side of the solar panel that did help cool the panels and increase production. I think the fan set up with a mister instead of a stream of water may be better. Evaporation has a cooling effect. I use a mister on my ac and it lowers the amps , temp and run time of my equipment.
Heating a pool with the water is a good idea. Pools will naturally dissipate the heat and you get a more comfortable pool to swim in.
extremely interesting love the enthusiasim on solar
for big plantations it is about the cost and waste water destination.
this maybe applicable for small projects where there is access to water source.
heating waterunder/through the panel always made sense to me, and could make hot water and improve efficiency.
Here in California we can't afford the water. Mark Snyder Electric in San Diego is working on some kind of solar panel cooling system. I'm not sure how it works. I think he said the cooling would somehow create distilled water that can be used. (He put in our solar panels 21 years ago. We have a 3.5 KW system. We make more electricity in the year than what we use.)
This is why solar works even in Canada with much fewer solar hours... the panels are being more efficient.
💯
You need to capture the water, cool it with evaporative cooling, then recycle it. That way you only need to replace the water that evaporates.
Yeah, you would need a closed loop and most likely a pool to get closer to a system that would make sense to scale.
@@everydaysolar, I was thinking something like that. Use it as a pool heater. Also, since you’re providing cooling, you could process more sunlight per panel, so you could use mirrors to reflect more sunlight onto fewer panels. Or maybe lenses on a box with smaller water cooled solar panels in the box.
Nice video and info but I think you will find 59F is closer to 15C not 33C. I can see with a roof with water capture that the loss of water could be minimised outside of evaporation and that with enough hot days, solar on hand or a separate solar pump perhaps this still makes sense. Simplified with a sprinkler or misting system perhaps both cost and installation time could also be reduced.
this will work on moutain areas where plenty of water fall exists . you just have to install all the solar panel by the water fall & direct a small amount of water toward the panels . many mountain villages got no power so it can work for them not for flat landers.
You can have a combined system that incorporates a passive solar water heater in the solar panels system.
Too much water is impairing the sunlight's ability to reach the solar panel. One of water's most significant properties is that it takes a lot of energy to heat it, and therefore very little water is needed in this application. You could also capture the water and recycle with a fish tank pump or similar.
Water on the panels will reduce the amount of light reaching photons, intermittent would be best.
would love to see this test by cooling the back plane. Such a closed loop system could (pre) heat water for your hot water system.