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What makes a solar engineer?

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Conference

2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Location

Baltimore , Maryland

Publication Date

June 25, 2023

Start Date

June 25, 2023

End Date

June 28, 2023

Conference Session

Energy Conversion, Conservation and Nuclear Engineering Division (ECCNE) Technical Session 1

Tagged Divisions

Energy Conversion and Conservation and Nuclear Engineering Division (ECCNE)

Page Count

11

DOI

10.18260/1-2--44617

Permanent URL

https://peer.asee.org/44617

Download Count

191

Paper Authors

biography

Joseph Ranalli Pennsylvania State University Hazleton Orcid 16x16 orcid.org/0000-0002-8184-9895

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Dr. Joseph Ranalli is an Associate Professor at Penn State Hazleton, teaching in the Alternative Energy and Power Generation Engineering program. He previously earned a BS from Penn State and a PhD from Virginia Tech, both in Mechanical Engineering. His research interests include solar energy and enhancing the use of technology resources in engineering education.

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biography

Mesude Bayrakci Boz Pennsylvania State University Hazleton

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Dr. Mesude Bayrakci Boz is an assistant professor engineering at Penn State Hazleton. She holds master’s and Ph.D. degrees from the Department of Energy and Mineral Engineering at Penn State with an emphasis on solar energy. Her current research focuses on solar energy integration to energy markets, energy management framework for electric vehicles charging systems and engineering education. She teaches fundamental engineering and renewable energy classes at Penn State Hazleton.

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Abstract

The international response to climate change has driven growing demand for engineers trained to design solar energy systems and integrate them into electricity infrastructure. There is a need for some guidance as to what training is necessary for future engineers to meet this demand. This study gathers data from literature, industry perspectives and current educational practice to help establish suitable learning objectives for training undergraduate engineers to be prepared for solar project development. In general, results suggest that students be trained to understand the complete workflow of concepts related to design of photovoltaic systems including solar positioning, the solar resource and irradiance data sources, design of a photovoltaic system from both a solar resource and an electrical perspective and performing calculations to model or support validation of photovoltaic systems. Professionals also highlighted the importance of discussing various types of typical financing structures for solar energy systems, though these were less common in existing courses. The paper summarizes these outcomes with a proposed set of learning objectives that encompasses these highlight areas and that could form the backbone of an undergraduate course on solar energy engineering.

Ranalli, J., & Bayrakci Boz, M. (2023, June), What makes a solar engineer? Paper presented at 2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Baltimore , Maryland. 10.18260/1-2--44617

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