Harnessing photo voltaic energy for thermal heating system

Abstract

In this paper, a type of renewable energy, PV system is proposed. The system is implemented in water heating. The main objective is to build a PV heating system which is able to absorb solar energy and convert into electrical energy; with the available electrical energy, thermal energy is produced. It is an off-grid system. The system consists of PV panel, controller, battery, inverter and heating element. PV panel generate DC power from the solar energy. The electrical energy is stored in battery. Heating element is an AC load, and inverter is needed to convert the DC power into AC power. The overall system is managed by controller. Function of each module in the system is further discussed in this paper. Simulation was done to prove the methodology of the system works an application to demonstrate the effectiveness of the implementation of the system under design.