Floating Solar Panel

Description

This project simulates a floating solar panel system, a photovoltaic installation deployed on a water surface rather than on land, using ANSYS Fluent. Floating this way brings several advantages over conventional ground-mounted panels: the water's cooling effect improves energy output, land use is freed up for other purposes, and the panel coverage helps reduce evaporation and limit algae growth on the water body beneath it. The simulation is fully 3D, capturing the panel floating on the water surface as it responds to the surrounding air and water phases. The geometry, comprising the water tank and floating panel, is built in SpaceClaim and meshed in ANSYS Meshing with a grid of 479,895 cells.

Methodology

Water and air are modeled as two interacting phases using the Volume of Fluid (VOF) multiphase model, capturing the free surface the panel floats on. Because the panel needs to move and settle naturally under buoyancy, a 6-degree-of-freedom dynamic mesh is used, allowing the panel to float freely, with remeshing and smoothing keeping the mesh valid as it moves. Radiation is also activated, using the Discrete Ordinates model, to capture how sunlight reaches and heats the panel surface.

Analysis

The volume fraction contour shows a clean, stable interface between air and water, indicating the panel maintains steady buoyancy without disruptive interface instabilities that could otherwise compromise its floating stability and energy generation. The incident radiation contour shows a largely uniform distribution of sunlight across the panel surface, supporting consistent energy output, while the temperature distribution shows a stable thermal profile with no significant hotspots, suggesting the design avoids the localized heating that would otherwise degrade efficiency or panel materials over time. Together, these results indicate the floating panel system performs reliably in its intended floating, sun-exposed environment.