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Bifacial PV in EnergyPlus

asked 2025-09-13 10:56:28 -0500

mep_engineer's avatar

updated 2025-09-15 09:37:04 -0500

Has anyone tried using bifacial PV in EnergyPlus and compared it with monofacial PV? Does EnergyPlus handle this well?

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answered 2025-09-16 12:31:06 -0500

updated 2025-09-23 08:12:58 -0500

I don't believe there is a way to explicitly model bifacial PV in EnergyPlus.

Only solar radiation incident on the normal side (pointing outward, the side the right-hand rule points to) of the surface will generate electricity. I supposed you could create two surfaces, one pointing at the sky and one pointing at the roof, with two Generator:Photovoltaic object referencing each of the surfaces, to model bifacial PV. You'd need to adjust PhotovoltaicPerformance for each appropriately, as I'd image the backside of the panel is not as efficient as the front side. I've never done this before, but I imagine it would work.

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Thank you so much

mep_engineer's avatar mep_engineer  ( 2025-09-23 08:29:54 -0500 )edit

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Asked: 2025-09-13 10:56:28 -0500

Seen: 1,040 times

Last updated: Sep 23