Performance and financial evaluation of various photovoltaic vertical facades on high-rise building in Malaysia

Photovoltaic (PV) façade on building envelope in an urban area can potentially produce clean electricity to meet the energy demand of the buildings and also provide weather protection. In order to assess the potential of PV application on building façade, energy generated and cost related to the PV installation, it must be analysed during the design process so that it can provide enough information to the designer, investor, and end user to make a decision in implementing renewable technologies. This paper focus on performance and financial evaluation using System Advisor Model (SAM) developed by National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) to evaluate the potential of vertical photovoltaic façade system on a high-rise building in Malaysia based on 5 possible design scenario using Heterojunction Intrinsic Thin-film module (HIT-Si) with the nominal efficiency of 15.6%. The annual energy generated through the vertical photovoltaic system is between 400-700 MWh meanwhile roof system generate about 240MWh annually. The payback period for the vertical photovoltaic system in Malaysia is about 12 years. Although the installation of photovoltaic vertical façade in the tropical region can be quite challenging especially in urban area, but with proper studies and carefully design approach, its can open new opportunities in Malaysian built environment.