Experimental evaluation of the performance of a photovoltaic panel with water cooling

A photovoltaic hybrid system cooled by water on the back surface has been designed, developed and tested for its performance evaluation. The performance of the proposed hybrid water cooled PV system has been evaluated for the weather condition of Dhahran, a city lying on the east coast of Saudi Arabia. The experimental results showed that with active water cooling, the module PV temperature dropped significantly to about 20% leading to an increase in panel efficiency of approximately 9%. Furthermore, at an irradiance level of 900w/m², the hybrid system produced 750w of energy whereas the PV only system collected nearly 190w.