BUILDING INTEGRATED PHOTOVOLTAICS - POTENTIAL AND APPLICATION

Abstract

Global environmental concerns and rapidly increase demands for energy, coupled with permanent progress in renewable energy technologies, are creating new opportunities to utilize renewable energy resources. Solar energy is the most abundant, inexhaustible and clean of all the renewable energy resources. Photovoltaics generate electrical power by converting solar radiation into direct current electricity using semiconductors that exhibit the photovoltaic effect. Building integrated photovoltaics (BIPV) are photovoltaic materials that are used to replace conventional building materials in parts of the building envelopes, such as the roofs, skylights or facades. There are several advantages of integrated photovoltaics over more common non-integrated systems which make BIPV one of the fastest growing segments of the photovoltaic industry. Building integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) systems may represent a powerful tool for achieving the ever increasing demand for zero energy and zero emission buildings of the near future.