Efficiency improvement of solar cell using compound parabolic concentrator and sun tracking system

Abstract

This paper presents how the efficiency of solar cell can be increased with the design of compound parabolic concentrator (CPC) and the implementation of sun tracking system. Sun tracking systems is an application of the machine vision (MV) and collaboration with data acquisition (DAQ) to systems by using a webcamera as a sensor and sound card as an output channel to drive a motor. The motors will react as the mechanism of the camera to make sure it always focuses on the target of sun. By using a MatLab software programming environment, closes loop control is implemented to provide interaction between camera and sound card as a device to control the motor to track the sun. Sun tracking system with webcamera will be an effective tool to increase the efficiency of the solar cells. Camera is the sensor of the system, be an eye of the human to take care and observe the sun. As soon the sun can be tracked with the CPC, the voltage, current and power received will always be at the maximum of the efficiency. This research could provide significant improvement in alternative energy.