Photovoltaics & Solar Thermal Heating

 PV Panels - How CAT use them
(Follow the link above for a short video on PV's)

With this type of solar you can get many types but the one we have looked in too and the one that seems like it will be the most viable for my school project is Mono Crystal Line panels, these have proven to be the cheapest and with a little more research about the orientation of the building I will be able to perfect the positioning of the PV.

Over all this should work relatively well in the centre of Nottingham as you can have this on the south facing side of the school. You also can use a system called 3 phase electricity on this school project. With any PV you will need to invert the energy that comes from the PV to your electrical port. Along with the 3 phase you will be able to have 3 G38 (If you have a larger system you will need a G59), along with this you will need to have engineering recommendations and agree with compliance.

Mono Crystal Line panels image by Jaspal Lehil

Also when looking at Pv you will need to take in consideration the weight of the PV as well as this will be an added load to the roof of the school and also as said before orientated to the correct position. When installing the PV you will need to bolt this down to the roof, going back to the load you will also need to consider that the PV its self may be heavy, generally in the range of 15-30 KG so this will also need to be factored as well. In addition to this the panel will need to be elevated and at a pitch of 35 degrees.  

Kingsmead Primary School, Cheshire

(For more info follow the link above)


Solar Thermal Panels

Solar Thermal Panels image by Jaspal Lehil

Looking at Solar thermal this is similar to the Pv system but this solar panel creates heat using the suns rays. when at CAT we where told that there are many different types of panels but the two most common are flat plate and evacuated tube collectors.

Now when I was at CAT we were given the change to replicate the flat plate also construct it and put it to the test. When in the testing phase we found that there can be many leaks that can be found if not maintained and installed correctly which would lead to a replace and can be very costly.

But how ever looking at the amount of sun that Nottingham gets this could be one of the more viable sustainable features we can incorporate in to the school project.

University of Oregon. Sun Path Chart Program. Available: http://solardat.uoregon.edu/SunChartProgram.html. Last accessed 31/03/2015.

Doing some research kingsmead school and looking at my school project I think the most useful and the one I should use is the first system. Now looking at systems at CAT and kingsmead, there system only heats up for the schools hot water for washing and bathing. But this shows it in practice on a functioning school. Therefore I can take this idea and implement it back in to my own project.