DAN ENERGY RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT

Electronics team
No Name of Members
1 Shimeles Tilaye
2 Miressa Abebe
3 Mekdes Bewketu
4 Mezgebe Gidey
Solar Panel design and installation system
Solar panel (also known as photovoltaic cell or solar cell) is a device which absorbs
photos from the sun light and converts to the electrical energy.

In recent years, the concept of of-grid and smart grid system is more populated and
consumer opting out for clean energy like wind and solar power system to eliminate
or at lease reduce the dependency on regular power from electricity provider and
reduce the overall running cost as well. An efficient solar power system with warranty
for many years will lead to recover the initial cost and free energy.

Main Components of a Solar Panel System

Below are the basic and general components and devices which needed for a solar
panel system installation at home. Details of each device is given below each section.

(1) Solar Panel

Solar panel also known as Solar Cell or Photo Voltaic Cell is the backbone of solar
power system.There are some types of solar panels such
as polycrystalline and monocrystalline. Mono crystalline is more efficient and little
bit expensive as compared to poly crystalline solar panels. The selection criteria for a
solar panel are different i.e. space, warranty, efficiency, technology type, cost etc.
Keep in mind that output is the king when selecting a proper solar panel for
residential solar power installation.
 In general, the solar panel is directly connected to the charge controller but there are
different connection of solar panel arrays such as series and parallel connection which
depends on load calculation and specific energy requirement for home appliances,
battery bank connection, roof surface space, climate and peak sunshine hours

(2) Charge Controller

A charge controller, charge regulator or battery regulator limits the rate at which

electric current is added to or drawn from electric batteries to protect against electrical
overload, overcharging, and may protect against over voltage
As the name suggests, a charge controller (also known as charge regulator) is a device
which is used to regulate the voltage and current from the solar panels connected to
the batteries. The main purpose of a charge controller is to prevent the overcharging
of batteries (which may lead to damage the battery as well) through solar panels as
12V solar panels provided 17-20V in case of no load or full sunshine. The reason
behind this scene is that manufacture design a solar panel for different climate and
environment so that, you get the max rated voltage in case of cloud cover, low
sunshine and heavy haze etc

There are multiple types of charge controllers are available in the market such as
follow
 Simple – 1 and 2 Stage Charge Controllers: Relay and shunt resistor are used to
control the voltage in single or two stages to disconnect the solar panel from the
battery in case of over voltage.
 PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) – 3 Stage Charge Controllers: It based on
pulse with modulation and cutoff the battery circuit from the connected solar panel
from the photo-voltaic cell in case of overcharging.
 MPPT (Maximum Power Point Tracking) Controllers: MPPT is a DC to DC
converter in case of solar panels array to the battery bank. It optimize and regulate
the higher DC voltage levels from the solar panel and convert to the lower
optimized and regulated voltage to charge the battery. These are little bit expensive
but more efficient. They provide 10-30% more power to battery with efficiency of
94-98%.
 (3) Battery

Batteries are used for backup charge storage. there are different types of batteries used
in solar power system for storage and backup operation at overnight when the direct
power from solar panels are not available. Series, parallel  or series-parallel
connection of batteries bank is depends on the system design i.e. 12V, 24V or 48V
system configuration. In case of clouds and no sunshine, the battery bank can be
charged through AC supply from power grid via inverter for later use.

The following fig shows a 150Ah, 12V. The battery is directly connected to the
charge controller which control the incoming charging currents and voltage from the
photovoltaic cell connected to the charge controller for backup storage and operation.

4) Inverter / UPS

Inverter is a device which convert the DC power supply to the AC power supply.
Inverter and converter which known as UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply) is used
to convert the DC voltage to AC for AC operated home appliances. UPS is also used
to convert the AC to DC to charge the battery from direct AC power supply.

There are many types of inverters available in the market according to your needs
such as follow:

 Centralized or String Inverter with less cost but inefficient.

 Power Optimizer used to convert DC to AC and connected to central inverter.
 Micro Inverter with smooth and reliable operation even with low sunshine but
costly.
The following fig shows a 1000 Watts, 12 V DC to 110VAC and 230V AC inverter. It
is connected between battery and load to convert battery output (12V DC to 230V
AC) to our home appliances which operate on 230V AC. The second slot is for 110-
120V AC operated equipment

Inverter & Converter (Charge Controller) Ratings

For choosing the proper inverter both the input and output voltage and current rating
should be specified. The inverter’s output voltage is specified by the system load, it
should be able to handle the load current and the current taken from the battery bank.
 Based on the total connected load to the system the inverter power rating can be
specified.

Let’s consider 2.5 kVA  in our case, hence an inverter with power handling capacity
having a size of 20-30% higher than the power running the load should be chosen
from the market. In the case of motor load, it should be 3-5 times higher than the
power demand of such an appliance. In the case of the converter, the charge controller
is rated in current and voltage. Its current rating is calculated by using the short-circuit
current rating of the PV module. The value of voltage is the same as the nominal
voltage of batteries.

Converter and Charge Controller Sizing

The charge controller rating should be 125% of the photovoltaic panel short circuit
current. In other words, It should be 25% greater than the short circuit current of solar
panel.

Size of solar charge controller in amperes = Short-circuit current of PV × 1.25

(Safety factor).

Inverter Sizing

The size of Inverter should be 25% bigger than the total load due to losses and
efficiency problem in the inverter. In other words, It should be rated 125% than the
total load required in watts. For example, if the required wattage is 2400W, than the
size of inverter should be:

Sizing of the Batteries

While sizing the battery some parameters are needed to be considered as follows:

1. Depth of Discharge (DOD) of the battery.

2. Voltage and ampere-hour (Ah) capacity of the battery.
3. The number of days of autonomy (It is the number of days required to power up the
whole system (backup power) without solar panels in case of full shading or rainy
days. We will cover this part in our upcoming article) to get the needed Ah capacity
of batteries.
 Also, the required capacity of batteries can be found by the following formula.

Different sizes of PV modules available in the market produce a different level of

output power. One of the most common way to determine the sizing of the PV array is
to use the lowest mean daily insolation (Solar irradiance) in peak sun hours as
follows;

The total size of PV array (W) = (Energy demand per day of a load (Wh) / TPH) ×
1.25

Where TPH is the lowest daily average peak sun hours of a month per year & 1.25 is
the scaling factor. With this the number of PV modules Nmodules required can be
determined as;

Nmodules = Total size of the PV array (W) / Rating of selected panels in peak-watts.

Note: The value of PFG (Panel Generation Factor) is varying (due to climate and
temperature changes) in different regions e.g, PFG in USA = 3.22, EU = 293,
Thailand = 3.43 etc.

Moreover, the additional losses should be considered to find the exact panel
generation factor (PGF). These losses (in %) occur due to :

 Sunlight not striking the solar panel straight on (5%)

 Not receiving energy at the maximum power point (excluded in case of MPPT
charge controller). (10%)
 Dirt on solar panels (5%)
 PV panels aging and below specification (10%)
 Temperature above  25°C (15%)
Sizing of the Cables

The sizing of the cables depends on many factors such as maximum current carrying

capacity. It should have a minimum voltage drop and have minimum resistive losses.
As the cables would be placed in the outdoor environment it should be water-resistant
and ultraviolet.

The cable must behave minimum voltage drop typically less than 2% as there is an
issue of voltage drop in low voltage system. Under sizing of the cables will result in
energy loss and sometimes can even lead to accidents. whereas the over sizing is not
economically affordable. The cross-sectional area of the cable is given as

Example:
Electric quantity Power for Average Average daily Average Average
appliance each(W) daily energy (watt- daily monthly
use(hr) hours) energy energy
(KWh) (KWh)
TV 20 100 8 20*100*8=16000 16 480
PC 200 60 2 200*60*2=24000 24 720
Light bulbs 400 60 6 400*60*6=4800 48 144
funs 3 30 1 3*30*1=90 0.09 2.7
stove 2 100 2 2*100*2=400 0.4 12
refrigater 5 200 2 5*200*2=2000 2 60
elevator 2 1300 1 2*1300*1=2600 2.6 7.8
CCTV 5 7 8 5*7*8=240 0.24 7.2
OTHER 35 2 70 0.07 2.1
50200

Now let’s find the number of solar panels, rating and sizing of charge controller,
inverter and batteries etc.

Finding the Total Load

Total Load in Wh / day=

16000+24000+4800+90+400+2000+2600+240+70=50200Wh/ per day

The required wattage by Solar Panels System

= 50200 Wh x 1.3 … (1.3 is the factor used for energy lost in the system)

=65260 Wh/day

Finding the Size and No. of Solar Panels

WPeak Capacity of Solar Panel

= 65260 Wh /3.2

= 20393.75 WPeak

Required No of Solar Panels

= 20393.75 / 600W=40

No of Solar Panels = 40 Solar Panel Modules

This way, the 40 solar panels each of 600W will capable to power up our load
requirements.

Find the Rating and Size of Inverter

As there is only AC loads in our system for specific time (i.e. no additional & direct
DC load connected to the batteries) and our total required wattage is:

Now, the rating of inverter should be 25% greater than the total load due to losses in
the inverter.

= 50200W x 2.5

Inverter Rating & Size = 125500W

Find the Size, Rating & No of Batteries

Our load wattage and operational time in hours

Nominal Voltage of Deep Cycle Battery = 12V

Required Days of Autonomy (Power by batteries without solar panel power) = 2 days.

[(50200) / (0.85 x 0.6 x 12V)] x 2 days

The required capacity of batteries in Ampere-hour = 16405.3Ah

This way, we need a 12V 16500Ah battery capacity for 2 days of autonomy.

In this case, we may use 4 number of batteries each of 12 V, 4125Ah connected in

parallel.

Required Number of batteries = Required capacity of batteries in Ampere-hour /

Available battery Ah rating

Find The Rating and Size of Solar Charge Controller

The charge controller should be 125% (or 25% greater) than the solar panel short
circuit current.

Size of solar charge controller in Amp = Short circuit current of PV × 1.25