Computational prediction of dust deposition on solar panels.

This research is concerned with performing computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations to investigate the air flow and dust deposition behavior around a ground-mounted solar PV panel. The discrete phase model (DPM) is adopted to model the gas-solid flow. The influence of the wind speed, the dust particle size, and the dust material on the dust deposition rate was investigated based on the environment of Cairo, Egypt. The wind speeds range between 1 and 11.5 m/s with an average of 3.7 m/s. It is found that increasing the wind speed decreases the dust deposition rate. For wind speeds higher than 2 m/s, it is found that increasing the dust particle diameter or the dust density increases the dust deposition rate. For wind speeds lower than 2 m/s, it is found that there is a critical particle size before which increasing the dust density causes dust deposition rate to increase and after which increasing the dust density decreases the dust deposition. The maximum percentage of deposition rate equals 10.8% and occurs for the dolomite dust material at a wind speed of 2 m/s and particles diameter of 150 μm.