Photovoltaic-thermal system coupled with ice bank

The rise in renewable energy capacities is crucial to reach general energy transition goals. The photovoltaic-thermal systems (PVT) are one of the market-available technologies that utilize solar energy for the production of heat and electricity. The overall performance of the PVT systems mainly depends on the specific design of the PVT collector and climate circumstances. In this work, the performance of the PVT system, coupled with the ice bank was experimentally analyzed in Mediterranean climate operating circumstances (city of Split, Croatia). The results indicated that the ice bank approach can slightly increase the production of electricity, however, it can significantly increase the overall efficiency of the PVT system thanks to the generation of usable heat. During the considered day, the developed PVT-PCM system collected 594 Wh of thermal energy, alongside 1210.2 Wh of electrical energy. The results are limited to short-term performance monitoring, i.e. the long-term experimental analysis is needed to get more precise data regarding the overall performance of the examined setup.