Nabeel Al Rawahi
Sultan Qaboos University
Nabeel Al-Rawahi is an Associate Professor in the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering (MIE) Department at Sultan Qaboos University. He has a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, in 2002. He had been the Head of the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department from 2011 to 2017. His research work covers areas of multiphase flow, computational fluid dynamics (CFD), and renewable energy. He published more than 40 reviewed papers in international peer-reviewed journals and conferences.
Solar energy is considered, after hydro and wind, as the third renewable energy source in terms of globally installed capacity. Sun tracking systems are used to increase the produced power from solar panels by tracking the... [ view full abstract ]
Solar energy is considered, after hydro and wind, as the third renewable energy source in terms of globally installed capacity. Sun tracking systems are used to increase the produced power from solar panels by tracking the sun to be exposed to higher energy levels from the sun. Geometrically, the amount of solar radiation received by a flat solar panel is a function of the orientation of the panel with respect to the location of the sun. Therefore, it is important to know the effect of having sun-tracking system versus fixed panel in order to select the most appropriate system.
In this paper, the Effectiveness of Different Sun-Tracking Strategies is studies using measured average solar radiation in Seeb area which is in Muscat, Oman. The total solar radiation received by a solar panel tracking the sun is calculated considering direct beam, diffused , and reflected radiation components. The models used in estimating the various solar fluxes had been presented and validated by the authors in another published article.
The results show that sun tracking systems can provide, theoretically, annual gain of about 38% for two axes tracking systems and up to 30% for one axes systems, compared to fixed horizontal systems. The gain varies during the year and ranges from about 25% in the summer, to 70% and 40% during winter for two and one axes tracking systems, respectively. The results also showed that using a simple adjustable solar panel which is adjusted just twice a year (i.e. from tilting angle= 23.58o to 0 o in April and from 0 o to 23.58o in September) will perform closely like a solar tracker which depends on rotating the panel around the east-west axis. The adjustable system will provide about 5% annual gain and up to 27% gain in the winter.
It is obvious that the selection of certain solar tracking system should take into consideration similar analysis as performed in this work and the electricity load variation during the year. Similar study will be done for six more locations in Oman to get better understanding of the effect of the geographical location.
