Residential solar panel performance improvement based on optimal intervals and optimal tilt angle

In this paper, daily and yearly performance of a solar panel for residential usage is improved. To this end, an optimization problem is proposed and solved to find the optimal periods for a given number of intervals. It is shown that a limited number of tilt angle adjustments can significantly increase the maximum power production of a solar panel if the intervals are chosen properly. Therefore, this paper proposes a three steps algorithm to find the optimal period for each interval. First, the optimal tilt angle for a given interval is computed by using a Bee Algorithm (BA). Second, an optimization problem is formed and solved to get new periods for all intervals, which is guaranteed to have a better performance than the previous periods. And finally, a stopping criterion is checked to decide whether the previous step has to be repeated or the obtained periods are acceptable. The effects of the initial intervals on the results of the proposed algorithm are also investigated. The effectiveness of the proposed approach is studied at the Binghamton area, NY, US. The results show improvement in the received solar power by using the optimal intervals.