16 January 2012
Masdar City and Swiss company, TVP Solar, have announced the completion of installation of a field of TVP Solar's MT-Power high-vacuum flat solar thermal panels for the solar cooling plant at Masdar City during the World Future Energy Summit 2012, taking place this week in Abu Dhabi.
Masdar City, one of the most sustainable cities in the world and one of the integrated units of Masdar, Abu Dhabi's multi-faceted renewable energy company, is testing TVP Solar's MT-Power panels for potential future use to meet the air-conditioning requirements of the City.
TVP Solar expects the MT-Power panels to provide over 70% solar-to-cooling conversion efficiency operating at 180 degrees C to drive a double-effect absorption chiller. The panels capture diffuse and direct light, thus providing at least 30% higher energy output than any concentrating collector. In addition MT-Power effectively operates in the harsh and dusty environment of the desert, requiring zero maintenance and no precision cleaning.
Combining traditional flat plate design with the best thermal insulator (high-vacuum), MT-Power panels, invented by Dr. Vittorio Palmieri, suppress convection losses and maintain the fluid-flow entirely within the vacuum envelope, thus providing unrivalled thermal performance while keeping a very low collector cost profile.
TVP Solar aims to deploy further MT-Power solar fields during 2012 for solar air-conditioning applications with double stage absorption chiller in a hybrid natural gas/solar system configuration that will operate on a 24/7 basis, covering peak and base loads. The Swiss company designs, develops, manufactures and markets high-vacuum flat solar thermal panels based on patented technology.
