Numerical investigation on the distribution characteristics of dust deposition on solar photovoltaic modules

The deposition mechanism of dust on photovoltaic modules plays a key role on predicting the dust amount, determining dust removal techniques and cleaning frequency. In this paper, a prediction model for adhesion and erosion of dust particles was established to address the uneven dust distribution on photovoltaic modules. The proposed model was validated through an experiment of dust deposition, which was set in the low-speed section of a wind tunnel. Three conditions of the dust deposition process were numerical investigated, while varying different wind speeds, array row spacings, dust particle sizes and wind direction. Results showed that wind speed was the main factor of dust deposition amount, and the change of wind speed and dust particle size had little influence on the distribution of dust deposition. Meanwhile, wind direction and array row spacing distinctly influenced the dust distribution. Increasing the row spacing induced relatively uniform dust distribution on the photovoltaic modules.