At present 1.7 MWp roofs and façades have been installed world wide using the Atlantis photovoltaic (PV) construction materials. These examples have contributed to the general acceptance of PV in the build environment particularly among architects.

On January 1, 1997, a new Task started within IEA's PV Power Systems Program: Task VII. Objective of Task VII is to enhance the architectural quality, the technical quality and the economic viability of PV systems in the built environment and to assess and remove non-technical barriers for their...

Static solar concentrators present a solution to the challenge of reducing the cost of Building Integrated Photovoltaic (BIPV) by reducing the area of solar cells. In this study a 3-D ray trace code has been developed using MATLAB in order to determine the theoretical optical efficiency and the...

There are various types of solar water heater system available in the commercial market to fulfill different customers’ demand, such as flat plate collector, concentrating collector, evacuated tube collector and integrated collector storage. A cost effective cum easy fabricated V-trough solar...

In reflective concentrating systems, mirrors play an essential role in directing and concentrating the energy from the sun to the modules. Shortcomings like misalignment, shading or bending of mirrors, due to their weight or wind, imply a higher probability of attenuated energy and non-uniform...

The increasing energy demand for air-conditioning in most industrialized countries, as well as refrigeration requirements in the food processing field and the conservation of pharmaceutical products, is leading to a growing interest in solar cooling systems. So far, the more commonly systems...

This paper aims to present an investigation into the operational performance of a novel heat pump assisted solar façade loop-heat-pipe (LHP) water heating system using both theoretical and experimental methods. This involved (1) development of a computer numerical model; (2) simulation of the...

A new concept of building integrated solar water collector and the experimentation are described, then experimental results are shown. Numerical calculations are performed in Matlab environment using a finite difference model and an electrical analogy.

The prospects for urban wind power are discussed. A roof-mounted ducted wind turbine, which uses pressure differentials created by wind flow around a building, is proposed as an alternative to more conventional approaches. Outcomes from tests at model and prototype scale are described, and a...