Experience and Prospects of Water Heating Using PV Panels

The paper deals with the photovoltaic panels application for water heating purposes. We have developed and tested the mathematical models for traditional and PV-based water heaters. Modeling shows that the area ratio for PV-based and collector-based water heaters with close productivity is about 1.6–2.3 for Russian southern regions and 1.2–1.6 for northern ones. PV-based water heating systems are shown to have several advantages compared to collector-based ones, including close capital costs in Russian conditions and simpler installation and operation, especially in northern regions of the country.

The paper classifies the commercial controllers for PV-based water heating systems. Modern commercial PV water heating systems are supplied with maximum power point (MPP) tracker technology controllers. Cost for such special controllers is quite high, and several manufacturers make them. The most of manufacturers consider PV water heating systems as a part of “smart home” or way to utilize excess of energy produced by PV array. Thus, the researches of possible improvement and cost decrease for PV water heaters are actual. It is shown that the possible way to simplify and make cheaper the whole PV water heater is to make it without controller but to use constant resistance element as electric load. In this case, PV array productivity decrease can be compensated by additional PV panels in the array, and the year heat production is higher than for collector-based system with comparable capital cost.

PV-based water heaters, solar collector, photovoltaic panel, photoelectric heater, photoelectric module

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