Sahara solar breeder for sustainable development of renewable energy

Abstract

The Sahara Solar Breeder Project is a joint Japanese-Algerian universities plan to use the abundant solar energy and sand in the Sahara desert. A solar breeder is a solar power plant that uses its own energy to build more solar power plants of this kind. Such a plant could become not only energy self-sufficient but a major supplier of new energy. Solar cells and modules usually show a gradual performance decline when deployed outdoors and exposed to environmental conditions. For this reason and in the context of the Sahara Solar Energy Research Center; five technologies of PV modules were installed in last December 2013 in the University of Saida to measure the performance characteristics and maximum output power of solar cells and modules. This system continuously acquires current, voltage and power from these five PV modules, which are automatically stored and later analyzed. In this paper a description of the PV measurement system based on outdoor module I-V curve installed in Saida and underground temperature measurement are presented.