Solar Water Heating Simulation Software

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Hi guys,

I am doing a thesis in college on a commercial solar water heating system that isnt operational yet and was hoping to run a simulation to determine output and temps etc. I have downloaded Retscreen and I have noticed that there is information required for the panel that isnt available in the specification.

What do you guys in the industry use? Any other good freely available software.?

quentingargan

Retscreen is a reasonble one for what is free, but we generally use T-Sol ourselves. What parameter are you missing in Retscreen?

I use Retscreen for solar PV and wind, but haven't used it for thermal, just because we have other stuff here that's bought and paid for...

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quentingargan wrote: »

Retscreen is a reasonble one for what is free, but we generally use T-Sol ourselves. What parameter are you missing in Retscreen?

I use Retscreen for solar PV and wind, but haven't used it for thermal, just because we have other stuff here that's bought and paid for...

I am missing a few bits of information:

Wind correction for Fr (tau alpha)

Fr (tau alpha) coeffecient

Fr UL coefficient (W/m²)/°C

Wind correction for Fr UL (J/m³)/°C

The information i have for the panels is

the aperture area, efficiency and

a1 (W/m2K)
a2 (W/m2K2)

I am presuming the information I am missing in Retscreen is American/Candian test procedures results?

Yes I came across T Sol in my search and its really expensive:eek:. Is it any good? Cheers for the reply quentingargan.

Do-more

T*Sol and Polysun are the two main software packages available in Europe for solar simulation.

I am told that you can get a one month time limited licence for T*Sol for around €50 even though this isn't advertised.

Quite often software companies will have special deals available for students so it is probably worth your while contacting both companies directly and outlining what you are doing and they may be able to help you out.

Polysun also have a free trial available for download on their website the results are fixed for one location (somewhere in Germany or Switzerland) which may be of use to you, you will at least be able to get to grips with the program and establish if the full version can do what you want it to.

quentingargan

Yes - wind effect is largely missing from EN12975 test reports AFAIK. The heat loss coefficients give you a good idea of what will happen on a windy day, but I haven't tried using Retscreen for this purpose. There are three day training courses held for Retscreeen from time to time (I think in Tipp Institute) and someone there would know.

What is missing on some packages (and very annoyingly is missing on the SEAI DEAP package used for Part L compliance) is the Incidence Angle Modifier (IAM). This varies enormously between flatplates and the vacuum flask type of tube. So the DEAP has an effective prejudice in favour of flatplates and/or tubes with a flatplate inside them. I wrote an article on this some time back here in Construct Ireland.

T-Sol and most other good commercial packages allow for IAM.

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Do-more wrote: »

T*Sol and Polysun are the two main software packages available in Europe for solar simulation.

I am told that you can get a one month time limited licence for T*Sol for around €50 even though this isn't advertised.

Quite often software companies will have special deals available for students so it is probably worth your while contacting both companies directly and outlining what you are doing and they may be able to help you out.

Polysun also have a free trial available for download on their website the results are fixed for one location (somewhere in Germany or Switzerland) which may be of use to you, you will at least be able to get to grips with the program and establish if the full version can do what you want it to.

Well thats good news I will contact both and see if they can do me a deal. I have downloaded the trial version of polysun and it will certainly be useful for the data I am looking for. Hope fully I can get the full version with all the weather files and systems

quentingargan wrote: »

Yes - wind effect is largely missing from EN12975 test reports AFAIK. The heat loss coefficients give you a good idea of what will happen on a windy day, but I haven't tried using Retscreen for this purpose. There are three day training courses held for Retscreeen from time to time (I think in Tipp Institute) and someone there would know.

What is missing on some packages (and very annoyingly is missing on the SEAI DEAP package used for Part L compliance) is the Incidence Angle Modifier (IAM). This varies enormously between flatplates and the vacuum flask type of tube. So the DEAP has an effective prejudice in favour of flatplates and/or tubes with a flatplate inside them. I wrote an article on this some time back here in Construct Ireland.

T-Sol and most other good commercial packages allow for IAM.

Thanks Quentin I will contact Tipp instute to see if they can put me in the right direction with Retscreen. Thats an excellent article and something I came across in my research. Its a shame that SEAI havent acknowledged this and improved the software. Thank you very much for your advice guys.