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Solar Energy 85 (2011) 922–930

www.elsevier.com/locate/solener

Heat dissipation performance of silicon solar cells by direct dielectric liquid

immersion under intensified illuminations
a b,⇑ c c c c
Liping Liu , Li Zhu , Yiping Wang , Qunwu Huang , Yong Sun , Zhaojiang Yin
aSchool of Environmental Science and Engineering, Tianjin Univ., 300072, China
bSchool of Architecture, Tianjin Univ., 300072, China
c
School of Chem. Eng. & Tech., Tianjin Univ., 300072, China
Received 1 December 2008; received in revised form 31 January 2011; accepted 10 February 2011
Available online 11 March 2011

Communicated by: Associate Editor Elias Stefanakos

Abstract

A novel cooling method for the solar cells under concentrated solar flux is proposed where the surplus heat is removed from both the front
and back surfaces of the module by directly immersing the cells in a dielectric liquid. The direct-contact heat transfer and compar-atively larger
heat dissipation surface area can achieve a fairly low cell temperature which results in higher sunlight conversion e fficien-cies. Heat dissipation
performance of the modules of both simulation sheets and solar cells were studied under the conditions of an irradiance of 50 and 70 kW/m 2. In
these studies a long-arc xenon lamp was used as the illumination source and dimethyl-silicon oil was used as the dielectric fluid. Experimental
results show that in turbulent flow, the temperature distribution of the module along the flow direction is quite uniform, resulting in a rise of
about 3 LC. The cell temperature can be cooled to about 30 LC and the corre-sponding heat transfer coe fficient is around 1000 W/(m 2 LC). The
liquid inlet temperature does not significantly change the distribution of the module temperature, but it has a linear relationship with the average
module temperature. After liquid immersion, the open-circuit voltages of the modules have small changes but large drops are in the short circuit
currents. The electrical performance of the modules immersed in the liquid fits reasonably well with the relationships with the operating
temperatures and thermal loads, but clearly with some degradation. The main reason for these is because the usage of common silicon cells
under concentrations.
2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Concentrator photovoltaics; Liquid immersion cooling; Convective heat transfer; Cell performance degradation

1. Introduction Passive cooling has higher reliability and it can be achieved

One of the effective ways to reduce the cost of solar elec-
trical generation is to utilize concentrator photovoltaic (CPV)
systems. In these systems, solar cells perform under high
illuminations with commensurate higher outputs but the
efficiency drops with the attendant increases in temper-ature,
so a reliable heat dissipation system is needed to cool the cells
effectively (Royne et al., 2005). Cooling technolo-gies of
photovoltaic systems can be divided into passive cooling and
active cooling.
⇑ reduced significantly. The theoretically optimized
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: zly13920679110@tju.edu.cn (L. Zhu).
by heat dissipation fins. Araki et al. (2002) developed a
passive cooling structure and used it for cells’ heat dispersion
under 500 suns. An American pat-ent passively cooled the
solar cell under multi-reflective concentrations mainly by
large surface area thermal radiation (Fork and Horne, 2007).
Aes and Hansen (2008) patented a cooling device for
photovoltaic panels. The basis layer was designed with many
protruding structures and was fixed to the panel back. Cui et
al. (2009) predicted that a single cell can reach a tempera-ture
of 1200 LC without cooling at 400 suns. With metal panels
added as the cooling device, the temperature could be

0038-092X/$ - see front matter 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.solener.2011.02.007
 L. Liu et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 922–930
cooling approach can reduce the cell temperature to only
37 LC.
In active cooling systems, heat is dissipated to a fluid
that flows in tubes at the back of the cell modules. Depend-ing
upon the level of the concentration ratio, air or water is often
used as the cooling fluid. Coventry (2005) used water with
anti-freeze and anti-corrosive additives as the cooling agent
and pumped it through an extruded aluminum tube to cool the
cells and reclaim thermal energy. Also, internal fins have been
incorporated in the fluid conduit to increase the heat transfer
surface in order to minimize the operating temperature
difference between the cells and the fluid. Mahderekal et al.
(2006) simulated and optimized a similar on a high
concentrator photovoltaic system to reach favor-able working
temperatures for the cells by water cooling. Mittelman and
Kribus (2007) used the collected thermal energy under
concentrations for absorption solar cooling and the
concentrator cells used are multi-junction cells with an
efficiency of 37%. Royne and Dey (2007) implemented a new
design of jet impingement cooling for densely packed solar
cells under high concentrations. Effects of the nozzle numbers
were investigated on the average heat transfer coefficients and
system pressure drop.
At present, no reports have been found that the concen-
trator solar cells were directly cooled by liquid immersion.
Several reports have been published, but these mainly focus
on the effect of the liquid in which solar cells was sub-merged
and its effect on the efficiency of the cells ( Russell, 1981;
Tanaka, 2003; Christian, 2000; Ugumori and Ikeya, 1988;
Abrahamyan et al., 2002). Russell (1981) and Tanaka (2003)
designed solar cells devices and improved the cell’s efficiency
by assembling the illuminations into the solar cells with the
refraction effect of liquid. Christian (2000) made the solar cell
work in a concentrated illumination by taking away the
remaining heat with a boiling liquid. Ugumori and Ikeya
(1981) studied the performance of solar cells submerged in a
liquid with laser illumination. Many years later, the research
results reported by Abrahamyan et al. (2002) further show that
the dielectric liquid can improve the solar cell’s efficiency
40–60%; and the reasons for this are the lower surface
recombination velocity and less reflection of the light because
of the fluid.
By directly immersing solar cells in some dielectric liquid
to lower the cell temperature, the contact heat transfer
resistance existing in conventional passive or active cooling
can be eliminated. The flowing fluid will take away the solar
generated heat by sweeping through all the surfaces of the
modules, which results in quite good cooling perfor-mance,
and a resulting improved solar conversion effi-ciency.
Therefore, it is more favorable for the solar cells to work
under medium and high concentrations, and less expensive
green power can be achieved (Mudawar, 1992; Danieson et
al., 1998; Arik and Bar-Cohen, 1998).
Cooling the solar cells using a dielectric liquid is reported
in the present paper. A small-scale experimental system was
first designed, and the heat dissipation perfor-mance under
different medium concentration ratios was
923
studied using various flow rates and coolant temperatures.
Results of the improved cooling performance with this
approach are described in what follows.
2. Experimental study
2.1. Experimental device
A sketch of the experimental device is shown in Fig. 1. The
glass container has the size of 1000 mm in height, 101 mm in
internal diameter and 6 mm in wall thickness. A long-arc
xenon lamp (Changzhou Yuyu Electro-optical devices
Company, Ltd.) was chosen as the solar simulator source
because of its spectrum similarity to sunlight. Its rated power
is 6 kW and the electrode spacing is 250 mm. The outside
diameter of the lamp is 9 mm, but since it needs water cooling
to moderate its working temperature, the external diameter of
the tubular cover is 25 mm. The immersion liquid selection is
a key issue for the liquid immersion cooling strategy, since at
the same time to achieve significant cooling capacity possible
degradation on cell performance is definitely undesirable. The
degrada-tion might come from the interactions between cells
and surrounding liquid or from the light trapping property of
the liquid to the cell’s responsive spectrum range. After
comprehensive considerations as well as detailed work,
dimethyl-silicon oil was selected as the immersion liquid. Fig.
2 gives the measured absorptance curve of silicon oil under
the full responsive spectrum range for silicon solar cells, from
which it can be seen that silicon oil is transpar-ent to the
responsive spectrum of interest and it is select-able for the
immersion liquid. Due to the different testing equipment for
the two spectrum ranges, 200–900 nm and 800–2500 nm, Fig.
2 has two graphs in parallel from differ-ent test organizations.
Furthermore, taking the responsive spectrum range of multi-
junction cells, the dimethyl-silicon oil is also favorable for
being the immersion liquid. The other results proving the
suitability of silicon oil as an immersion liquid will be
presented in other papers. The physical properties of the used
3
silicon oil are viscosity of 4.575 mPa s, density of 915 kg/m ,
thermal conductivity of 0.12 W/(m LC) and heat capacity of
1.55 kJ/(kg LC). The liquid used in the experiments here was
manufactured by Shanghai Hualin resin company Ltd.
Due to the shortage of concentrator solar cells in China,
common silicon cells 2CR (5 mm 5 mm, Beijing Photo-
electric Devices) were used in the present experiments. The
spectrum response range is from 400 nm to 1100 nm and the
2
photoelectric sensitivity is 6–8 m lA/mm . For the sake of
reducing system expenditure, some simulated cell modules
were made and tested in parallel with the real cell modules.
The material used to make simulated modules has a thermal
conductivity of 73 W/(m LC), heat capacity of 0.46 kJ/(kg
LC) and the thickness of 0.4 mm, which are fairly similar to
the silicon semiconductor. The front sur-face of the simulation
strip has an absorptivity of 0.74 to the solar spectrum (Ge and
Na, 1989).
924 L. Liu et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 922–930

1-pump; 2-valve; 3-flowmeter; 4, 6-measurement holes; 5-glass vessel; 7-receiver;

8-xenon lamp; 9-pipeline; 10-heat exchanger; 11-discharge valve; 12-cooling agent inlet;
13-cooling agent tank; 14- cooling agent outlet

Fig. 1. Simplified diagram of the experiment device.

Fig. 2. Absorptance curve of silicon oil under the full responsive spectrum range for the silicon solar cells.

2.2. Thermal load calculation
2.2.1. Electro-light conversion efficiency of the xenon lamp
The rated power of the used solar simulator is 6 kW, but part
of the electricity is converted into heat. The actual light
density is needed to determine the illumination density
incident on the modules. Based on the energy balance prin-
ciple, the electricity consumption of the xenon lamp is con-
verted to two energy forms: thermal and light. With the lamp
cooled by flowing water, the by-product of thermal energy
was obtained by measuring the mass flow rate of the cooling
water and the temperature increase. Mean-while, the real
electricity consumption of the simulator was obtained by
measuring the working voltage and circuit of the xenon lamp.
The measured actual power usage of the lamp is 5961.53 W,
and the heat taken away by the cooling water is 3327.31 W,
thus the electro-light conversion effi-ciency of the xenon lamp
is 0.44. Therefore, the corre-
sponding rated light power of the simulator is 2.64 kW.
2.2.2. Liquid absorption
Beer–Lambert law was used to determine the overall
absorptance of the silicon oil layer of certain thickness. The
relation used for liquids is written as
I=I0 ¼ 10 a l
Under a given temperature, the short circuit current I sc of a
silicon solar cell varies linearly with the light density, so the
Isc of the solar cell was measured under different thicknesses
of the liquid film. Then, the light densities under di fferent
liquid film thicknesses were obtained, and the absorptance
was found. All the absorptance values for thicknesses from 10
to 70 mm were averaged and found to be 0.0115 cm .
1
2.2.3. Theoretical thermal load calculation
As shown in Fig. 3, the long-arc xenon lamp can be seen as
a uniform linear light source. A two-axis coordinate sys-tem
was established by using the lamp long axis and any point
outside. The lamp axis forms the x-axis with one of its ends as
the origin and the other setting at point (L, 0). Each
differential section dx of the lamp located at (x, 0) is
considered as a point light source and gives spherical radiation
flux of Ue. The incident angle from this section to the point A
(a, b) is b, as shown in Fig. 3. The liquid film thickness
between the lamp and point A is given as l and the
corresponding absorption coefficient is a . According to the
inverse square law, the irradiance at the point A after the
liquid absorption can be expressed as
Ie ¼ U cos b 10 a l dx
e
ð2Þ
ð1Þ 2
4pl L
 L. Liu et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 922–930 925

Y A(a,b) illuminated face Table 1

Calculated results of the incident flux and its distribution on the cells.
l
b (mm) 2
X (kW/m )
a = L/2 a = L/4 a=0
¦Â 8.0 203.1 202.7 101.7
linear light source 10.0 161.1 160.6 80.7
12.0 133.1 132.4 66.7
16.0 98.0 97.2 49.2
18.5 83.8 82.9 42.1
dx 22.0 69.3 68.3 34.9
X 23.5 64.5 63.4 32.5
K(x,0) 30.5 48.0 46.7 24.4
L

For installation, a support frame was firstly installed

Fig. 3. Schematic configuration for calculating the thermal loads. around the lamp at a certain distance for a given incident flux.
Then the insulation strips at the module ends were fixed to an
After integrating the irradiance of all the sections, the elastic metal collar at a space of 8 mm. The distance and the
resulted irradiance from the xenon lamp at the point A is: module installation location need to be adjusted to reach a
Z Ue cos b 10 a ldx ð3Þ uniform light density distribution. The pictures of the receiver
E¼ L
before and after installation are shown in Fig. 5. Since the
0 4pLl 2
receiver is assembled in a collar shape around the lamp,
The above equations were solved with a Matlab pro-gram, longer installation distance means more modules needed. The
and the calculated irradiance X and the irradiance distribution cell module number is certain of five, so different numbers of
along the x direction are listed in Table 1. simulated modules were used. The number of the simulated
It is seen that the light intensity attenuates with the dis- module is 19 and 13 when the ther-mal load is 47.3 and 68.8
tance from the lamp axis. With water cooling for the xenon 2
kW/m , respectively.
lamp, since the outside radius for the cover tube is 12.5 mm,
the allowable largest concentration is less about
2.4. Measurements
100. This would not affect the medium concentration
experiments here. However for the high concentration work,
2.4.1. Module temperature and distribution
the cover will be removed and the silicon oil will directly act
Temperatures of cell module 1, 3 and a simulated mod-
as the cooling agent for the lamp in order to
ule were measured by copper-constantan thermocouples
obtain shorter distance. At the lamp ends (x = 0 or x = L) and
(diameter 0.127 mm, TT-T-36, OMEGA). A thermocouple was
at the center (x = L/2), there is a difference of 49% in the
soldered in the soldering layer as well as to the back surface
fluxes with this arrangement, but for the center and quarter of the copper substrate. Two temperature sensors were placed
locations, the difference is lower than 3%. So, in the at 25 mm from each of the two ends of the module. Six
experiments afterwards, the test units were only installed in sensors were soldered into the intermediate soldering layer
the range from L/4 to 3L/4, parallel to the light source. This 2
assured a nearly uniform incident light den-sity. The incident when the X is 47.3 kW/m , and the corre-sponding locations
2 are T1/T2 for cell module 1, T3/T4 for cell module 3, and
flux X used in experiments is 47.3 and 68.8 kW/m , with a T5/T6 for the simulated module from the top to the bottom.
distance correspondingly of 30.5 and 22.0 mm. 2
During X = 68.8 kW/m tests, the T3 location was moved to
the back of module 1. High mass flow rates were used during
the experiments. As a result the measured temperature
2.3. Cell modules assembly and installation
increase of the cooling agent was less than 0.6 LC, so in
reporting the results only
As shown in Fig. 4, the silicon solar cells were fixed to the
copper substrate by soft soldering. All the negative elec-trodes
of the cells were soldered to the copper substrate. One end of
the copper substrate was soldered with a copper wire as the
negative connection. All the positive electrodes of the cells
were connected together and then soldered to a copper wire as
the positive connection. Two insulation strips were connected
at the two ends of the copper sub-strate for installation. One
module consists of 20 single cells in parallel. Five modules
were made in total, and they were connected in series. Table 2
lists some feature dimen-sions of the cell module.
Fig. 4. Diagram of the solar cell module used.
926 L. Liu et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 922–930

Table 2 simulation sheet, silicon cell or copper substrate, and the

Feature dimensions of the used solar module. relevant absorptivities a to the xenon light:
Item Feature size (mm)
qs ¼ X as ð4Þ
Total length 205
Cell area L W 125 5 q c ¼ X acSc þ X acp Scp ð5Þ
Copper substrate L W H 165 5 0.4 S þS
c cp
Cell dimensions L W H 5 5 0.3 where the subscripts s, c and cp respectively mean the sim-
Insulation strip L W H 40 5 2
Soldering layer thickness 0.05 ulation module, cell module and copper substrate.
The Reynolds number of the immersion liquid in the
the inlet temperature is given. This temperature was mea- glass vessel was calculated as
sured using a PT100 thermocouple. The flow rate of silicon Re ¼ duq=l ð6Þ
oil was measured by a turbine flow meter with the precision
of 0.5% (LWGY turbine flow sensor, Tianjin Instrument The average temperature of the receiver was expressed
Group Co., Ltd.). with the following equation:
Þ
¼ n ð
2.4.2. Electrical performance of cell modules T P
am
n
1 Ti 7
The electrical performance of the PV modules was mea- where n is the number of the measurements considered.
sured before, during, and after liquid immersion. A halogen
2
tungsten lamp was used to provide a 1 kW/m illumination The temperature difference between the receiver’s sur-
for the tests before and after liquid immersion. The temper- face and the coolant was expressed as:
ature variation of the module during a test was kept in the Dt ¼ T am tc ð8Þ
range of ±1 LC, and of ±2 LC for parallel tests. The open-
where tc stands for the average temperature of the coolant
circuit voltage Voc of modules was detected using a multim-
and is taken to be the inlet temperature in these experi-
eter (VC9801A+3 1/2) and the short circuit current Isc were ments as was discussed earlier.
obtained by using a known resistance (R = 0.101 X)
To set the receiver surface area, the corresponding heat
method. The voltage of the sampling resistance was mea-
dissipation surface area is more than doubled because the
sured by an automatic temperature controller (AI-518/
liquid-immersed cells expose all of theirs surfaces to the
518P, accuracy: ±0.3 V). The light density was calibrated
liquid. Then the heat transfer coefficients are given as:
with a pyranometer (PSP, The Eppley Laboratory, Inc.).
The Voc and Isc of the solar cell receiver during liquid hs ¼ qs=2Dts ð9Þ
immersion were measured by a programmable sourcemeter qcðSc þ Scp Þ
(2400 SourceMeter Instrument, Keithley Instruments, Inc.). hc ¼ ð 10 Þ
DtcðSc þ Scp þ SbÞ
3. Analysis methods where ac and acp is the absorptivity of silicon and copper to
the sun spectrum and equals 0.90 and 0.25, respectively
The effective thermal load per unit receiver area qs was [13]. The surface area of silicon cells Sc is 100 mm by
determined by the incident flux X, reception area S of the 5 mm, the surface area of copper substrate Scp is 65 mm

Fig. 5. Pictures of the receiver before and after installation.

 L. Liu et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 922–930 927

by 5 mm, and the back surface’s area to dissipate heat S b is
125 mm by 5 mm.
4. Results and discussion
4.1. Temperature distributions
Fig. 6 gives the temperature distributions for the cell
modules under two incident fluxes and the comparative results
2
of the simulation module for the X = 68.8 kW/m situation. It
is straightforward to see that with higher flow rates, the
difference between the two points on any module becomes
smaller and the two representing curves become closer. For
the effect of thermal load on the cell tempera-ture, it is clearly
shown that a more intensified illumination causes a higher
temperature. With regard to the compari-sons between the cell
module and simulation module on the temperature
distributions, it is shown that under a same Re number, the
temperature difference between the top and bottom points of
the cell module (T1/T2) is larger than that of the simulation
module (T5/T6). For Re = 1999 when the velocity is fairly
small, the difference between T1/T2 is about 10 LC, while for
T5/T6, the value is only less than 5 LC. The reason why the
simulation module has a compar-
180 X=47.3 X=68.8 T1
160 q=30.5kW/m2 q=44.3kW/m2
140 T2
Re=1999
C
atively uniform temperature distribution is because during the
production of this module, the back surface profile of every
simulation strip is quite similar, which is favorable for uniform
contact between the strip and the copper sub-strate and also an
even soldering layer thickness, as a result, the thermal
resistance is quite even. But for the cell modules, it is di fficult
to have an even soldering layer thick-ness, and also the
uniform contact condition. The different thermal
conductivities at different locations results in differ-ent local
heat transfer coefficients, so, the temperature dis-tribution of
the cell module is inferior to the simulation module.
Some contradictive trends exist between the results under
the two different thermal loads with regarding to the
temperature distribution. Technically, the module tem-perature
increases in the flow direction because of the con-tinuous heat
absorption. But the reverse trend is given for the curves when
2
X = 47.3 kW/m , where the module tem-perature decreases in
the flow direction. The reason for this is based on the
difference between the overall heat transfer and local heat
transfer in the present system. The liquid flow rate is so large
that there is nearly no temperature dif-ference between the
inlet and outlet. Thus, the temperature distribution of the
module is mainly affected by the local heat transfer
coefficient. Since the collar shaped receiver was fixed by a
frame which is inside the flow field, the local heat transfer
performance will be changed. For the differ-ent thermal loads,
the collar diameter varies depending on the distance between
the receiver and the lamp axis. Also, the number of simulation
cells used and their fixture frame are different from the PV

120 T
1 arrangement. So, different local heat transfer coefficients
T/ o

100 T2 could make the reverse hap-pen. But for higher fluxes, the
80 Re=6098 overall heat transfer takes the dominant role even though there
60 is still variation on local performance, so the temperature
T1
distribution becomes as expected. Therefore, for a real system
40 T2 using the liquid immersion cooling method, an optimized
20 Re=14194 design of the cell assembly and receiver installation is very
20 30 40 50 20 30 40 50 60 important.
o
t/ C t/oC
(a) cell modules
160 X=68.8
4.2. Average temperature of the modules
T5
140
T6 The curves of the average temperature of the cell module
2
120 Re=1999 are shown in Fig. 7a. When the thermal load is 47.3 kW/m ,
T5 the module average temperature can be cooled down to about
2
T/ o C

100 T6 30 LC. With X is increased to 68.8 kW/m , the average

80 Re=6098 temperature is still less than 45 LC and the heat removed from
T5 2
60 T6
the module surface reaches about 44.3 kW/m . The module
Re=14194
average temperature drops with the growth of the Re number
40 and increases with the growth of coolant’s temperature. The
average temperature of the cell module has a positive linear
20 30 40 50 60 70
relationship with the cool-ing agent temperature. The average
t/oC
temperature of cell module and simulation module at X = 68.8
2
(b) simulation modules kW/m are compared and the results are shown in Fig. 7b,
where the curves are plotted under different liquid inlet
Fig. 6. Temperature distribution curves of different receivers. temperatures and Reynolds numbers. For a similar Re number,
the
928 L. Liu et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 922–930

160 X=47.3 X=68.8 Re 160 X=68.8

140 q=30.5kW/m 2 2 1999 140 Re

q=44.3kW/m
4098 1999
120 120 4098

T/ o C
C
6098 6098
T/

100 8097 100 8097

o

80 80 10096
10096 12095
60 12095 60 14194

40 14194 40

20 30 40 50 20 30 40 50 60 20 30 40 50 60 70
o o
t/ C t/ C
(a) cell modules (b) simulation modules

Fig. 7. Average temperature changes of different receivers.

simulation module has a lower temperature than the cell 1200 X=47.3 X=68.8 Re
module. This is due to the fact that the absorptivity of the 2 2
1000 q=30.5kW/m q=44.3kW/m 1999
simulation cell is 0.74, which is lower than 0.9 of the silicon

o.C)
cell. For the simulation module, the positive linear 4098
relationship is also apparent between the module average 800 6098
temperature and the liquid temperature. α/( W/m 2 600 8097

4.3. Heat transfer performance 10096

400 12095

The curves of the heat transfer coefficient between the cell 200 20 30 40 50 20 30 40 50 14194
module and cooling medium are shown in Fig. 8a. When the
60
liquid temperature increases from 17 LC to 46 LC, there is
t/oC
minor change on the overall heat transfer coefficient. Once
(a) cell modules
the Re number and liquid temperature are set, the overall
1200 X=68.8 Re
convective heat transfer coefficient for various Xs is nearly
the same. The heat transfer coefficient changes significantly
2
with Reynolds number, and its value is about 1000 W/m LC 1000 1999
when Re number is 14,194. From the comparative curves in
C)

800 4098
Fig. 8b, it can be seen that under the thermal load of 68.8
2 6098
kW/m the heat transfer character-istics of the simulation
α/(m .o2

600 8097
module and cell module do not vary much and the coefficients
have almost the same values, which means that the di fference 10096
in materials basically does not influence the heat transfer 400 12095
performance.
200 14194

20 30 40 50 60 70
4.4. Electrical performance analysis t/oC
The electrical performance of the cell module measured (b) simulation modules
before, during, and after liquid submersion is shown in Fig. 9.
Fig. 8. Curves of the convective heat transfer coefficient a.
Variations of Voc and Isc before and after liquid immersing are
given in curves in Fig. 9a. In this figure the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4
and 5 represent the five single mod-ules which were Contrarily, all the Isc curves show attenuation after the
numbered as shown in Fig. 5, while the notation 1–2, 1–3, 1–4 concentration tests. The main reason is that there is a linear
and 1–5 represents the series-connected module number. As relationship between the light intensity and the short circuit
shown from Fig. 9a, there is no change in the V oc curves after current under a certain working temperature; the large cur-rent
the liquid immersion experiments. This indicates that short will cause degradation on fingers and connections, and
time intensified illu-mination and high working temperature increase the series resistance. This will decrease the I sc,
would not cause degradation of the Voc of the silicon cells especially for the parallel-connected common silicon cells
used here. used under concentrated intensity.
Voc/V

Isc/mA
 2
32
1
A B
C
A--before; B--after,X=47.3;C--
after,X=68.8
(a) before and after tests
Fig. 9. Isc and Voc curves of different modules before, during and after immersion tests.
The curves of Voc and Isc of the five series-connected
modules submerged in the liquid during tests are shown in
Fig. 9b. The Voc does not have a pronounced increase with the
increasing light intensity and it drops about 0.6% with a 1 LC
temperature increase. The Isc curve changes a little more
significantly with illumination inten-sity, so it can be seen
2
from the figure that the curve of X = 68.8 kW/m still lies
2
over that for X = 47.3 kW/m . But because of the series
resistance and parallel resistance of the silicon cells, the
increase relationship is not linear. There is no significant
increase in the Isc with increasing temperature, which
indicates that under intensified illumi-nation s and liquid
immersion, there is no obvious effect of temperature increase
on the Isc of silicon cells.
5. Conclusions
The heat dissipation performance of solar cells and sim-
ulation cell modules under moderately intensified illumina-
tions by using liquid immersion cooling was studied. The
results show that the cell module has a fairly uniform tem-
perature distribution and the maximum temperature differ-
ence is less than 3 LC under turbulent flow mode. Higher flow
velocity means higher heat transfer for the module surfaces,
which decreases the module temperature and also makes the
temperature distribution more uniform. Possible negative
effects on parasitic power consumption of such liquid
immersion concentrator photovoltaic systems by increasing
flow rates will be explored in the recent future. With the X of
2
47.3 and 68.8 kW/m , the module can be cooled down to less
than 30 LC and 45 LC, respectively, and the heat amount
removed can reach 44.3 kW per unit module surface area. The
overall heat transfer coefficient is
(b) during tests
nearly the same no matter what the incident flux is and is
2
about 1000 W/(m LC). The simulation module has a com-
paratively more uniform temperature distribution than the cell
module, which is caused by the thermal resistance dif-ference.
The average cell module temperature is higher than the
simulation module because the absorptivity of the sim-ulative
sheets (0.74) to sunlight is lower than silicon cells (0.9). No
significant changes were detected on the module temperature
distribution with increasing cooling medium temperature, but
the average module temperature has a lin-ear relationship with
it.
No changes occur in the Voc curves after the liquid
immersion experiments, which indicates that short time high
illumination and high working temperature would not cause
degradation of the Voc of the silicon cells used. However, all
the Isc curves have a decreasing trend with immersion. The
main reason for this is that the common silicon cells used in
this study are not suitable for high con-centrations. During
liquid immersion tests, with every degree Celsius increase in
temperature the Voc drops about 0.6%. The Isc increases with
the light density and there is no significant rise on the I sc with
the increasing temperature.
Acknowledgements
The authors acknowledge the technical support from the
Center for Sustainable Energy Systems in Australian National
University under the APP6 (Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean
Development and Climate) project “Increasing efficiency of
linear concentrators to capture solar energy”, a large-scale
international cooperative project between Tianjin University
and Australian National University. Acknowledgements were
also given
930 L. Liu et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 922–930
to Professor Robert F. Boehm in University of Nevada, Las
Vegas for his fine revisions of the present paper.
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