Comparative study of diverging and converging coaxial jet nozzles for thermal management of H-CPV modules

Jet impingement cooling is widely recognized as one of the most effective methods for achieving high heat transfer rates in compact systems, making it particularly suitable for cooling photovoltaic devices. This paper investigates the effects of newly designed coaxial nozzle configurations on the thermal management of a high-concentration photovoltaic system. Four different nozzle geometries, such as square, circular, hexagonal, and triangular, are considered, with constant outer cross-sectional areas, while the inner sections are designed to diverge or converge. Simulations are performed for Reynolds numbers of 2000–4000 and dimensionless coaxial nozzle-heat sink distances of 0.5–3. The results reveal that the coaxial nozzle enhances heat transfer performance compared to conventional nozzles. The diverged triangular coaxial nozzle achieves the best heat transfer at a Reynolds number of 4000, with a 19 % increase in the modified Nusselt number compared to the conventional triangular nozzle. The highest temperature uniformity (6.39 °C) is observed in the converged hexagonal coaxial nozzle, while the lowest maximum and average cell temperatures (46.1 °C and 44 °C) are achieved with the diverged triangular coaxial nozzle. The lowest pressure drop (1297 Pa) is found in a diverged hexagonal coaxial nozzle, corresponding to the lowest net electrical power (17.53 W) and cell efficiency (38.97 %). Despite the pressure drops, the diverged triangular coaxial nozzle achieves the highest electrical efficiency of 39.41 %, as its geometry promotes favorable power generation. The coaxial configuration increases the cell efficiency by up to 1.13 % and improves temperature uniformity by 23.3 %. Total exergy follows the same trend as electrical exergy, with the converged hexagonal coaxial nozzle exhibiting the highest total exergy efficiency of 38.35 %. The findings demonstrate that coaxial nozzles can significantly improve thermal uniformity and system efficiency in high-concentration photovoltaic cooling applications.