Thermal Environment and Animal Comfort of Aviary Prototypes with Photovoltaic Solar Panel on the Roof

Abstract

The areas on the roofs of animal production facilities present great potential for generating solar energy. However, the impact that the addition of new material on the roof can generate on the installation’s thermal environment is still poorly studied. Thus, this study aims to investigate the effect of the application of photovoltaic panels in the roofs of prototypes, in reduced-scale aviaries, on the thermal environment, and on the animal comfort condition inside the prototypes. For this, six prototypes of aviaries on a reduced 1:5 scale are used. They are equipped with three types of tiles (ceramic, fiber-cement, and metal), with and without a photovoltaic panel. The effect of applying the photovoltaic panel is verified by evaluating the air temperature, the surface temperature of the roofs, the temperature and humidity index (THI), the black globe humidity index (BGHI), and the radiation heat load (RHL). The results show that applying the photovoltaic panel on the roof, regardless of the type of tile, is efficient in reducing the air temperature by about 0.4 °C, the BGHI by about 0.7, and the RHL about 4 W/m2. As for THI, there is only a 4.8 reduction in fiber-cement roofs.