Wind Issues in Solar Thermal Performance Ratings (2009)

This report comes from the United States National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), and was written by Jay Burch of NREL and Ross Casey of the University of Colorado. It reports on their research findings on issues with the U.S. Solar Rating and Certification Corporation’s (SRCC) solar thermal performance ratings system. The researchers studied potential biases in SRCC’s testing of glazed and unglazed collectors in regards to how wind is factored into the testing. Glazed collectors had been being tested under high winds, whereas unglazed collectors had been being tested under low winds, so performance ratings were consistently skewed against glazed collectors. The researchers suggest a new testing standard which would employ a “calibrated collector model to derive a wind correction to the measured efficiency curve.”

Author: Jay Burch, Ross Casey

Date: 2009

Pages: 11

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