Laurentiu FARA1*, Silvian FARA2 and Ana-Maria DABIJA3,

Polytechnic University of Bucharest PUB, Bucharest, Romania
2Design and Research Institute for Automation — IPA SA, Bucharest, Romania
3Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism — UAUIM, Bucharest, Romania
* Corresponding Author, lfara@renerg. pub. ro

Abstract

The paper is based on a research national project (under work) focused on the promotion of new architectural concepts which include active solar systems (PV generators) and passive solar systems (lighting systems). The advantages of using the distributed solar architecture are more conspicuous in the case of large network-connected PV systems, such as the PV systems in the urban area, installed on the buildings facades or roofs. The major purpose of the project is to demonstrate the efficiency of integrating various PV elements in buildings, to test them and to make them known so that they can be used on a large scale.

To demonstrate this purpose, the new products will be installed on three pilot buildings (two in Bucharest and one in Timisoara) and the PV modules will be integrated in consonance with their architecture. One of them will be a historical building and the other two will be new buildings; they will have different typologies and they will be located in different areas. The estimated installed power for each building will be of approximately 1.000Wp, including some technologies with PV modules integrated in the architecture of the buildings.

Keywords: building integrated PV, distributed solar architecture, pilot buildings.

1. Introduction

The future large-scale utilization of renewable energies is a world-wide priority, which can not be neglected by anyone. Currently, the world photovoltaic market approaches maturity, being in a continuous process of expansion reaching an annual increase of over 30% after 2003. The main actors on the market are Japan with roughly 48%, EU with 25% and the USA with 13%. The second position of the EU is primarily due to the fact that it massively financed specific programmes for the development of this area. Germany, for instance, launched in January 1999 the programme for the installation of 100,000 PV roofs before 2004 with an installed power of 300 MW, the users being granted excellent incentives (Report of the European Commission: Energy End — Use Efficiency and Electricity Biomass, Wind and Photovoltaics in the European Union — EUR21297EN). In the Report “Status of Photovoltaics in the Newly Associates States” (2004) elaborated based on the European project PV-EC-NET continued with PV-NAS-NET (FP6), it is stipulated that “the promotion of renewable energy sources” is an absolute priority of the EU. This is based on the Kyoto Protocol referring to the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere and on the policy of security in the energy area.” The EU goal is to reach a production of energy from renewable sources of 21% of the electric energy consumption in 2010, compared with only 6% in 1998.

It is well known that the necessity to harmonise Romanian standards to the European ones, with precise goals regarding environmental degradation prevention (the Kyoto Protocol was ratified by the Parliament of Romania, Law no. 3/2001) and to promote sustainable development has determined the Government of Romania to qualify the importance of the promotion of renewable energy sources as “national objective” (art. 3, Government Decision (GD) no. 443/10.04.2003). The general objectives of the Strategy for the Utilisation of Renewable Energy Sources are stipulated by GD no. 1535/18.12.2003 and include

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the integration of renewable energy sources into the public energy system and the attenuation of the technical-functional and psycho-social barriers related to the use of such energies; the identification of cost and energy efficiency elements; the promotion of private investments on the renewable energy market. The integration of PV systems into building facades and roofs determining a new form of electric power plant, i. e. the distributed electric power plant, is the market segment with the highest rise worldwide, considered as the most attractive for the future, [2-8].

„Solar Architecture” is a general term which implies the integration of photovoltaic system into classical building design. The key concept here is represented by the photovoltaic modules, which substitute some facade or roof components. For the design and construction of solar/PV systems it is necessary to have information about the solar energy collectable on tilted surfaces. In Romania, the meteorological stations have no such databases and do not perform such measurements. This means that the application of numerical methods is limited because of the lack of data resulted from specific meteorological-climate observation. Although in Romania the building market is rapidly developing, the building contractors do not promote PV technologies and new materials used for high performance day lighting, either because of their ignorance or their conservativeness, or the high costs related to importing such systems from the European market. Though during the last years more private companies in Romania offered to merchandise and install PV systems, one can not discuss of a proper PV market. Thus, in contrast to other EU states, in Romania there is no photovoltaic building construction branch, the limited number of isolated cases being not enough to argue the start if a photovoltaic market in the building industry.

In general, the design of such buildings one should pursue the optimization of the processes of dimensioning and orienting the surfaces on which the components collecting solar energy are to be placed in order to obtain a maximum of collected energy, satisfying at the same time the quality with regard to destination of the building, the designing and aesthetics rules. Therefore, the data regarding the solar energy collectable on tilted surfaces represent a vital prerequisite for architects and engineers who have to size the PV or thermosolar systems, for the specialists who have to elaborate feasibility studies associated to the implementation of solar installations.

Compared with other European countries, Romania has an above-average solar irradiation in the summer, comparable to the one of Greece, country in which the solar/photovoltaic technology is highly developed. Stand-alone private PV systems and the ones supplying energy also into the grid can be an attractive investment solution. A key element for the promotion of these renewable energy sources is the education for the sustainable development of the economic and social life of the population, especially young people, future inhabitants of houses designed and built using the new concepts of solar architecture. The effort to carry out a project of such a span requires human resources highly qualified in different areas of study such as urban architecture, the physics of photovoltaic devices, the physics of atmosphere (solar radiation), applied electronics (electrical measurement methods), data transmission, informatics, database administration.