Abstract:
The sensitivity of mono-crystalline solar PV module towards dust accumulation, ambient temperature, relative humidity, and cloud cover is investigated
from May to August 2015 for Niamey’s environment. Two solar modules with
the same characteristics have been used to carry out the impacts of the dust on
the solar PV module. One of the modules is being cleaned every morning and
the second one was used for monitoring the effect of dust accumulation onto
the surface of the unclean module for May and June. The ambient temperature around the solar PV module was recorded at the same time with the
output voltage and the output current to assess the impacts of ambient temperature on the PV conversion efficiency. In addition to these field test measurements, the solar radiation data measured in National Center of Solar
Energy (CNES) of Niamey were also used. Also the relative humidity for the
study area data obtained NASA power agro-climatology website was used.
Results show that the dust accumulation has the greatest impact on the performance of the PV module followed by temperature, relative humidity and
cloud cover. Exposing the module in 23 days has reduced the energy output
by 15.29%. The power output and the conversion efficiency of the PV module
have dropped by 2.6% and 0.49% respectively. The relative humidity also has
reduced the energy output by 4.3 Wh/m2
/day
