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The cost of manufacturing and electricity consumption are key considerations in encouraging the adoption of solar air heaters (SAH) in sunny and low‐income areas. These parameters can have a significant impact on promoting the use of these devices. In this study, solar air heating was designed with the objective of achieving the highest possible efficiency/cost ratio. It is a corrugated channel SAH whose structure is equipped with two barriers perforated with a sufficient number of holes for a good airflow distribution. A new model was developed to evaluate the qualitative parameters that describe the thermos‐energetic behavior of a heating system. These parameters were measured using experimental data obtained under real operating conditions. The thermal model assumes a uniform temperature for the glass, absorber, and insulation of the collector, while the temperature of the circulating air is assumed to vary linearly along the collector. To ensure that these assumptions were valid, the collector was cut into a number of 0.1 m sections in the direction of flow. By comparing the numerical results with the experimental data, the model was validated and then used to calculate the temperature profiles of the different elements of the collector, as well as to estimate the impact of certain operational parameters on its thermal performance. Relative percentage error values, between the numerical and the experimental results, of 1.7517%, 1.0750%, 0.8577%, 2.2371%, and 2.3637% for absorber plate temperature, outlet airflow temperature, useful power, thermal, and effective efficiencies, respectively, are recorded. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The performance of photovoltaic (PV) modules is affected by the increase in their operating temperature. Accurate and reliable prediction of the PV module operating temperature (TM) is useful for evaluating their electrical performance and productivity and predicting the maximum power point under changing weather conditions. Based on experimental measurements collected during 1 year by a station placed in a semi-arid coastal region, in Morocco, several models are investigated to predict TM of polycrystalline PV modules. Starting from existing models in the literature, models have been developed to improve the accuracy of their prediction in the studied climate. The results show that irradiance (G) and ambient temperature are the most influential parameters for estimating the TM of the studied PV module. The accuracy of the prediction can be improved by introducing the effects of Vw and RH in the proposed models. In addition, using the physical parameter extraction results of the studied modules, equations are established to approximately predict their behavior as a function of TM and G. Taking into account the proposed TM models, these equations describing the physical parameter evolution can constitute an important basis for predicting PV module performance under real operating conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a study on photovoltaic module physical parameters behavior depending on irradiance G and module temperature TM is presented. From this investigation, new equations translating physical parameters behavior depending on TM and G are developed. The new proposed laws, which combine the effects of G and TM in a correlated manner, have the advantage of incorporating G effect on the temperature coefficients by including specific terms. The developed laws form a basis for predicting PV module performance and can be incorporated into maximum power point tracking (MPPT) programs to extract peak power output under different operating conditions. This study is conducted by examining the electrical performances at the maximum power (Im, Vm), the open circuit (0, VOC), and the short circuit (ISC, 0) points measured using an elaborate experimental platform. The photovoltaic module used is a monocrystalline type exposed to four G values of 700, 800, 880 and 1000 W.m-2 for temperatures TM between 16°C and 48°C. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The islanding of grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) installations is a difficult problem that leads to many protection and security problems. A variety of islanding detection methods (IDMs) are proposed in several studies and these techniques are categorized into passive, active and communication based methods. This study describes the IDM adopted to detect islanding situation in the new PV installation connected to LVs grid of OCP Group (Cherifian Office for Phosphates in Morocco), global leader in the phosphate and phosphate derivatives markets. After having defined the way in which the PV generators will be integrated within the OCP Group grid, the causes that could lead to islanding situation are established. The comparison on the most used methods for islanding detection in the grid connected photovoltaic system (PV) is based on three parameters: the Non-Detection Zone (NDZ), the Detection Duration Time (DDT) and Total Harmonic Distortion (THD) of each method. These performance criteria are compared with the limit thresholds authorized by the IEEE 1574 standard, which are 5% for THD and 2 seconds for DDT. The Slip Mode Frequency Shift (SMS) method is demonstrated to be the most effective, for our installation, among the simulated methods, with THD and DDT of 1.3% and 0.28s, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a new method of modeling PV modules in the Pspice simulator is proposed. This method consists in describing the behaviour of PV modules and the evolution of their I-V characteristics as a function of the temperature and the solar irradiance. The developed modelling technique is based on the internal physical parameters (photogenerated current (Iph), saturation current (Is), ideality factor (n) of the diode, series resistance (Rs) and shunt resistance (Rsh)) extracted using a high performance extraction method based on the experimental characteristics of the studied module. Experimental measurements of I-V characteristics were taken, under real operating conditions, using a high-precision I-V curve plotter. The values of these parameters are injected into the single diode model established under the Pspice simulator. This technique allows to construct with satisfactory simplicity the I-V curve of different PV module technologies under different environmental conditions. The comparison of simulation results and those obtained experimentally shows the accuracy of the used method. Furthermore, based on measured data, extracted saturation current, series resistance and ideality factor seem to be not influenced by the variation of the irradiance. Then, the comparison of the extracted parameters with those calculated by empirical laws proposed in literature, shows the reliability of these laws and this for the studied monocrystalline PV module. Moreover, it has been studied, experimentally and with empirical laws, the evolution of the efficiency and the power, of the studied PV module, as a function of the temperature. It appears that the rise of temperature from 25° C to 55° C deals with an electrical efficiency drop of about 2.2 %. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work presents the UC@MOOC project as a pedagogical innovation to face the effects of massification that are making Moroccan universities endure many constraints for the past ten years, as well as other African universities. It aims, among its objectives, to cope with the massification factor and to overcome the language difficulties encountered by students. In this project, our top priority is to reduce academic failure then we will get to the point of responding to the training' needs. Courses are scripted and posted online which did not require many resources, so their production cost is relatively low. Audiovisual digital content also helps us to save time, and go to a hybrid teaching or even flipped classrooms in some cases. The idea is not to suppress the face-to-face courses but, instead, to place teachers at the center of this educational innovation. The online posting of free content allows students to deepen knowledge autonomously and independently. We will present the low-cost economical model that has been used to support this initiative and the challenges that we are facing. Some provided ideas on the critical success factors of this initiative will be described and discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Open education is one of the most important settings in every society. It grants everyone the right to learn freely. Today, technology is helping to make learning even more open by providing an environment of online education, which plays a remarkable role in shortening distances and encouraging students to learn. At Cadi Ayyad University (UCA) the new-enrolled students are facing linguistics barriers as well as overcrowding in classrooms, in particular for those in open access institutions. Subsequently, they cannot have an easy access to their face-to-face courses. To help students to overcome these problems, the university has decided to design an online environment for all courses and programmes. The most innovative project adopted at UCA to face massification was inspired from the massive open online courses and was designed as an open Educational platform entitled UC@MOOC. More than 120 scripted courses have been posted online so far. In this paper we will describe and discuss an analytics research on geometrical optics course designed for around 2000 students at UCA. Through out this research we will explain how this initiative has been considered as a source of producing open educational resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]