Researchers at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi have marked a breakthrough in the world of solar. Researchers have developed solar photovoltaic (PV) tower for power generation.
These towers will generate power for electric vehicle charging stations, rooftop power generation for building and for agricultural activities such as water pumping. The uniqueness of the project is the design. It is designed in such a way that panels at the top will not place the one at bottom in their shadow, making the system more efficient.
The research team was led by Dalip Singh Mehta, professor in the physics department. The team has developed both mechanical and non-mechanical tracking solar PV towers. The mechanical tracking solar PV is portable in nature. A statement from IIT Delhi claims that these solar PV towers panels are shadow less, space-saving and suitable for power generation during all seasons in India.
The panel tower models have been patented by IIT Delhi and licensed to a company called EP Sunsol for commercialization. These have already been deployed in IIT Delhi, Chennai and Navi Mumbai.
“After intensive research, we [succeeded] in arriving at the lightweight and cost-effective novel design on mounting solar PV towers along with high reflectivity mirrors to follow the Sun movement. Both non-mechanical and mechanical solar towers are able to generate 20-25 percent and 25-30 percent more power respectively while utilizing only 50-60 percent rooftop space compared to conventional solutions,” said Mehta.
Source: career360