Review Reports

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report (Previous Reviewer 3)

The paper can be recommended for publication 

Author Response

Thank you very much for your recommendation. 

Reviewer 2 Report (Previous Reviewer 2)

The manuscript has been sufficiently improved to warrant publication in the journal.

Author Response

Thank you very much for your recommendation. 

Reviewer 3 Report (Previous Reviewer 1)

The variation of Rsh is not physically acceptable. See the file!

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

None

Author Response

Please, see the attachment. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report (New Reviewer)

This work aims to estimate the performance of polycrystalline and monocrystalline photovoltaic (PV) modules in arid regions characterized by a large potential of solar irradiation and high temperatures. The comments are as follows:

1. In the abstract, the authors failed to discuss about how the work has been done. 90% of the writeup is related to results. Rewrite the abstract, focusing on the problem statement, objective, methodology, advantage of the proposed work and finally results. 

2. Why the work has been done is not clearly mentioned. Clearly mention the gap of the research along with its contributions not objectives.

3. For performance analysis, a minimum of 3 to 5 years data is required. Because the performance of the solar panel starts degrading after 3 years. However, in this study only 6 months data has been used which is not sufficient for such study.

4. There are various optimization algorithms are available. However, the reason for choosing Artificial Hummingbirds Algorithm is not clearly mentioned in the paper.

5. It is not clear for PV system parameters extraction why an optimization algorithm is required? As it is well known the data are collected through sensors in the cloud and later on just download the data from cloud and do the necessary analysis.

6. In page 24 the authors mentioned "compared with other similar studies". However, there are no such comparative study has been found in the paper to distinguish between the performance of the proposed method and existing.

7. The conclusion is not supported with numerical results.

Moderate

Author Response

Please see the attachment. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report (Previous Reviewer 1)

No remarks

No remarks

This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

put a comma before respectively

see line 417 for the meaning of Rs, Rsh, Ipv, 473 I0, A which must be written in the text as: Rs is the series resistance, etc.

line 515, the values of VTi,j

Explain the values of Rsh, lines 671-619. 

None

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

1.Figures from 8 to 16, correct "m2" into "m²".

2.Table (2), need to more adjustment.

3.All equations must be referenced.

4.Figures 20 and 21 are not clear.

5. Details of measuring instruments and their calibration are not present in the manuscript.

 

6. Details of  uncertainty analysis and experimental procedure are not present in the manuscript.

7.The results and discussion part need to improve further especially need more scientific explanation.

8.You must add a table of nomenclature and abbreviations.

9.English language required a significant change. Author should re-check paper carefully.

10.The innovation of the paper is summarized as compared with previous studies at the end of the section.

 

 

Quality of English language need to double check.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

REVIEW FOR MS: Evaluation of the Performance of Polycrystalline and Monocrystalline PV Technologies in a Hot and Arid Region: An Experimental Analysis.

Authors conducted numerical and experimental investigation to identify the better characteristics of the solar photovoltaic module out of the available two options. Substantial review is required for possible consideration in sustainability journal.

1. Abstract of the article should provide need of the research in one or two lines, significance and then results part. However, abstract is not concise restructure the abstract accordingly and mention that what is the need of that study?? Research gap/ novelty should be mentioned in the last paragraph of the introduction section

2. In line no.31 there is some typing mistake in “power droop”.

3. Check the entire paper that it should be free from typographical and grammatical error. English proofing must be requiring before submitting the revised version of the article.

4. Why author has selected a period for experiments during non-summer months?? Justify in result and discussion section.

5. Kindly provide a single graph for day wise variation in solar radiation, ambient temperature and wind velocity if measured.

6. What is the role of local ambient conditions in maintaining average surface temperature of the solar panels in both cases? Discuss the same in results section.

7. Whether the solar panels checked for “blind spots” before testing in experiments?

8. Author should discuss previous related studies on the same studies and compare with their own studies to identify the relevancy of the data.

9. Why authors selected AHA algorithm only to optimize the parameters? And if then what is the convergence profile of the algorithms including numbers of iterations and constraints?

10. The link between algorithm portion and experimental results are not synchronize kindly improve the same in results and discussion section.

11. Does these conditions for power drop applied to a specific region or all hot and arid regions provide the answer in conclusion section!!

12. What should be the chances of power drop if cooling mechanism is provided to panels during operational duration?? Identify some potential literatures on that and discuss the possible outcomes.

13. Future scope and how this article addresses the question to communities those who aim to install solar roof top and/or large scale solar power plant can helpful that needs to strongly discuss in abstract and conclusion portion.

I look forward to receive the revised version of the article after addressing these major concerns!!

Proof reading must be required before submitting the next revised article to the journal.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

-Regarding Manuscript ID:  sustainability-2438349 entitled: “Evaluation of the Performance of Polycrystalline and Monocrystalline PV Technologies in a Hot and Arid Region: An Experimental Analysis”.

The manuscript is focused on analyses of the performance of polycrystalline and monocrystalline PV panels influenced by temperature and dust.

In the experimental section, there is a lack of experimental methodology information. Experimental methodology is not clear and like that very hard to understand and possibly reproduce or check or address to research. Not specified which panels are used, manufacturer, and specification. There is an obvious shade on one of the panels in Figure 1b which can greatly influence results confidence. What for are PV generators, not mentioned in the manuscript? Too many blurry pictures, and there is no block diagram or experimental setup which is more appropriate. Authors have introduced several terms like solar irradiation, dust, and temperature but there is no clear methodology explaining how these conditions are controlled, quantified,… It seems that the experiment is not done with care.

Results are duplicated Figures 7 and 8 represent the same result as pictures 3-6. Too many graphs for one experimental method (integrated and separated)… Although results of I-U and P-U curves are maybe expected they show nothing new and it can’t be trusted because of unsystematic experimental methodology. Too many redundant and duplicated results. Discussion is very modest. Figure 17a and 17b should compare two panels at different incident solar irradiations but solar irradiation are different for these two panels also experimental points are different and some experimental points missing.

The manuscript sounds unsystematic and not done with care and clarity. In my opinion, no original contribution is presented, no new material, no new experimental method. No novelty or impact of this research. The only original contribution is adopting the AHA algorithm which is already publicated in references [22,29]. The application AHA algorithm for PV is not explained clearly enough.

The significance, novelty, quality, and scientific soundness of the manuscript are too low for publication in Sustainability.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 5 Report

The introduction section is a bit lengthy, and it is recommended to compress and organize it in the order of the research content in the article.

 

There are many figures that can be deleted, such as Figures 3-6. Place the power voltage diagrams of single crystal and polycrystalline silicon modules together as shown in Figure 7 to form Figure 7 (b). It is recommended to use clear symbols to distinguish the data of single crystal and polycrystalline silicon photovoltaic modules. For example, single crystal silicon photovoltaic modules use solid symbols, while polycrystalline silicon uses hollow symbols. The other figures are so similar. At the same time, there is a lack of description and analysis of the results in the graph, and the discussion of the results is not in-depth enough.

Lack of comparison between simulated results using AHA algorithm and experimental results, and discussion on whether the results are consistent.

In discussion, the description of monocrystalline silicon and polycrystalline silicon photovoltaic modules is incorrect, for example, '"Monocrystal solar panels have solar cells made from a single crystal of silicon while polycrystalline solar panels have solar cells made from several fragments of silicon melted together. "Monocrystalline solar cells are more effective because they are cut from a single source of silicon. Polycrystalline solar cells are blended from multiple silicon sources and are slightly less effective. "

In the discussion section of the article, p-Si and m-Si appeared without specific definitions.

English writing is acceptable, but it can be polished to improve reading smoothly.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

None

none

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

.The manuscript has been sufficiently improved  

The quality of English language is fine.

Author Response

Please see the attachment. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Paper can be recommended for possible publication

Author Response

Please see the attachment. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 5 Report

Please Check the curves in Fig.9-10 for monocrystalline and polycrystalline silicon PV module.  

Author Response

Please see the attachment. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf