Development of Electrical Shielding system for auto dust removal for solar PV modules
Currently, Large-scale solar PV systems installations are taking place in the desert environment and space to harness abundant solar energy effectively. Dust accumulation on the surface of photovoltaic panels (PV) is the most stignant problem for photovoltaic panels, as dust deposition reduces PV problem energy generation efficiency significantly. Thus, the removal of dust from the PV panels has become very important to increase the rate of energy efficiency by the PV panels. The dust particles could be reduced using traditional dust cleaning techniques. But, in the harsh and hostile desert environment, these approaches which requires a lot of water, complicated mechanical instruments, enormous logistics, and personnel. Electrodynamic dust shielding (EDS) system has been developed at our laboratory to remove dust particles from the surface of the PV panels. The EDS system has been successfully tested for dust mitigation. The unique features of our EDS System is that it is cost effective, easy to install and no manpower required as it is an unmanned system. The design and construction of a single-phase electrodynamic dust repulsion device built locally in KSA is demonstrated in this study. This work showed that the optimized electrode design and electrical parameters, such as AC source voltage and frequency, maximized the EDS system's dust mitigation effectiveness. A perfect balance was achieved between the geometrical and electrical parameters of the EDS system, resulting in a dust removal efficiency of up to 92±1 ℅.