I am interested in seeing solar water(or other liquid) heating being made more versatile and applicable. Let's simplify the concepts and the systems to reduce the barriers to entry for parties interested in integrating such systems into hot water/space heating.
The panels and attached hardware up to a point constitute a system acting as a source of heat. This system is dependent on certain exterior factors to produce this heat, and it provides that heat to an attached exterior system. The rate of heat production is dependent not only on the exterior factors (location/weather/temperature) but also dependent on the internal state of the system.
That is, as the internal system heats up, it's efficiency of heat absorption is reduced. However, we would typically need a high temperature to transfer that heat into our destination, like a hot water storage tank.
A simple system could heat up a certain amount above our destination temperature, then we can induce circulation and allow heat transfer until we hit another lower temperature threshold. And allow this cycle to repeat. It's simple, but it's not efficient. We could optimize the efficiency if we minimize the temperature inside our heat source system!
A heat pump would be perfect for this, it could use refrigerant to efficiently transfer heat from our solar source to whatever our destination is. A path for hardcore do-it-yourselfers to follow to design and build their own heat pump to meet their needs would be sweet.
Although this is all speculation on my part. I'm unsure how much efficiency of transfer is affected with a rising solar panel temperature. Data would be necessary to determine if it's economically justifiable..
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