Assessment of photovoltaic power system in Aswan city

Grid connected photovoltaic power systems are most promising for application in both urban and remote areas. Aswan city receives almost 13 hr of sunshine daily with an average of 6.0 kWh/m/sup 2//day. The long term performance of solar cells can be estimated. Logical efforts should be made and attention given to utilizing solar energy, particularly solar photovoltaic (PV) power systems, as this appears to be an available solution for the socioeconomic development of the majority of the population. Also, PV power systems provide a reliable, clean and environmentally friendly energy with no transmission losses. So far, no details have been presented to assess the potential of applying a PV power system in Aswan city. The system studied consists of crystalline solar modules mounted on the roof of a building, and an inverter to convert the dc power to ac power. The paper presents the feasibility of applying a PV power system in Aswan city. Different residential loads were considered to examine if the proposed system can supply the whole load of large blocks of buildings. The five parameters solar cell model is used to determine the performance of solar modules. The inverter efficiency is considered as a linear function of input power.