The scientific sessions of the international conference "Prospects of Solar Energy in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia: Applications and Challenges" organized by the University, represented by the College of Engineering, on its first day yesterday, Wednesday 24/4/1442 AH, discussed a number of themes, research and scientific studies with the participation of many academics and researchers in solar energy applications and industry experts in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the world remotely.

The first scientific session of the conference was held under the title "Solar Power Generation", where Dr. Emad Shams presented a paper titled "Identifying the solar maximum tracking issue using swarm dynamics inspired algorithms", during which he discussed methods of tracking the solar maximum power point to make the photovoltaic system in optimal operation, taking into account the costs, then Dr. Ahmed Eid spoke on "The impact of distributed solar power generation on energy loss and voltage stability for distribution networks Dr. Ahmed Eid then presented his paper titled "Impact of Distributed Solar Power Generation on Power Loss and Voltage Stability of Distribution Networks", in which he discussed the integration of distributed solar generators with distribution networks to reduce active power loss and enhance voltage stability.

Then, Dr. Hamid Mohammed presented a paper titled "Evaluation of crystalline silicon PV module operating conditions for frequency distribution for the city of Riyadh", during which he emphasized that PV module performance varies under external field conditions and can be better analyzed using frequency distribution under different operating conditions, as the purpose of this study was to find the most common operating conditions for PV modules that can be used for planning, designing and sizing PV power plants, Dr. Rupmati Meena spoke about his paper titled "Degradation of Crystalline Silicon Photovoltaic Modules under Hot Climatic Conditions". "Degradation of crystalline silicon PV modules under hot climate conditions", in which he revealed that crystalline silicon PV modules are prone to defects and degradation under hot climate conditions such as in desert areas that suffer from multiple environmental stresses, high temperature, UV radiation, along with changing temperature and humidity with gas ingress, where these stress factors can lead to structural, mechanical, thermal and chemical changes within the PV module that affect its electrical performance.

Then Dr. Manahil Mohammed spoke with a paper entitled "Solar energy as an alternative to electrical energy in Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030", during which she addressed the opinion of the Saudi people on the use of solar energy as an alternative to electrical energy in homes. The researchers applied a questionnaire containing 216 samples from different segments of society, and the questionnaire contains four parts, and when the sample was asked about the need to use renewable energy sources to generate electricity instead of generation from oil derivatives, 88.8% of the sample agreed, and when asked about the most appropriate source of renewable energy sources for investment in Saudi Arabia, they agreed.

At the end of the session, Dr. Hisham Osman presented his paper titled "Thermal characteristics of a parabolic trough collector (comparative study)." He emphasized that parabolic troughs are the most advanced CSP technology, as operating temperatures in the range of 350-550°C can be achieved in parabolic troughs, and parabolic trough solar power plants can produce from 5 to 280 MW.

The scientific sessions of the conference continued through a session entitled "Desalination using solar energy", where Dr. Qazi Bari spoke about his research entitled "Porous column type solar desalination unit", in which he addressed the sources of high-quality potable water that are rapidly diminishing in many urban and rural areas of the world, especially in the Middle East, Africa and Asia for many reasons, and the removal of salinity and impurities in raw water by any traditional method is still expensive, so the researcher and decision makers tried all possible cost-effective alternatives, and one low-cost method to produce

Then, Dr. Zakaria Amara spoke about his study titled "Solar distillation with a rotating wheel for desalination: He explained that the back wall of the distiller is not exploited and through it a large heat loss occurs, so a metal disk was installed on a horizontal shaft that rotates by an electric motor, and the rotating disk is located in the middle of the back wall and this works to increase the area of evaporation and the area of exposure to solar radiation, when the disk rotates it gets wet with a thin layer of water which helps speed up evaporation, then Dr. Abdullah Naguib spoke about his research entitled "Solar desalination using multi-effect membrane distillation: This work addressed the performance of a solar desalination system using the membrane distillation process. This system consists of solar photovoltaic panels, solar thermal collectors and a membrane distillation unit, the latter is based on multiple-effect membrane distillation in which the thermal energy is recycled and reused in the system when the cooling in the condenser is turned on.

In turn, Dr. Abdul Qader Abdullah presented a research entitled "The effect of adding trays on the performance of solar distillation, an experimental approach." The productivity of solar desalination units is proportional to the depth of water and the wetted surface area inside the unit, the productivity of the unit can be increased by increasing the surface area of the basin, to maintain the minimum possible depth of water inside the unit we used shelves, and two desalination units were designed and manufactured, the first unit of the traditional type and the second modified unit with shelves, and research experiments for the modified desalination unit were designed, manufactured and conducted for the purpose of improving the productivity of the modified desalination unit. In addition, it was designed according to safety standards, and the goal of this work is to increase the productivity of fresh water by some changes in the design of the unit, where we obtained an increase in the productivity of the racked desalination unit by approximately 45% compared to the conventional unit, and the daily efficiency was 47% and 34% for the racked desalination unit and the conventional unit, respectively.

The first day of the conference concluded with a scientific session titled "Materials used in solar energy applications", which witnessed the participation of Dr. Nazek Al-Attab with a paper titled "Ultra-flexible, stretchable, lightweight and highly efficient silicon solar cells for unmanned aerial vehicles." The study emphasized that the demand for unmanned aerial vehicles is increasing significantly due to their wide range of applications including, but not limited to, agricultural inspection, firefighting and border security, as well as current drones that run on electricity, but if they are equipped with solar energy technology

Dr. Rupmati Meena, presenting his paper titled "Investigation of different types of defects in newly manufactured crystalline silicon photovoltaic modules", said that solar photovoltaic cells have recently become a promising renewable energy technology, and solar energy is being utilized all over the world. However, photovoltaic cells face many manufacturing stage defects even before actual use, and these defects not only affect the performance of the cells, but are likely to cause severe performance degradation within a few years of field operation After that, Dr. Sadek spoke about a research paper entitled "Design, fabrication and testing of low-cost flat panel collectors under the climate of central Qassim", during which he emphasized that energy is the main basis for economic, technical and social development, and with the increasing global awareness of energy challenges, solar energy has been given great attention as a promising solution to energy issues, and in this research a small-sized, naturally circulating, low-cost solar collector with a solar receiving aperture of 0. 75 square meters was designed and fabricated in this research.The solar collector was tested to heat 20 liters of water during the day in the city of Unaiza from October 18 to November 4. 75 square meters at the College of Engineering in Unaiza, Qassim University, and the collector was tested to heat 20 liters of water during the day.

At the end of the session, Dr. Mohamed Moussa presented "AMX3 Inorganic Metal Halide Perovskite as Promising Candidate Materials for Future Photovoltaic Solar Cell Technologies", during which he emphasized that since the first appearance of photovoltaic solar cells in 1976, many scientists have directed tremendous efforts to improve the performance and efficiency of conventional photovoltaic solar cells, and a range of inorganic semiconductors have been used to manufacture photovoltaic solar cells For his part, Dr. Mohammed bin Rabahah spoke about his paper titled "Silicon Nanowires for Photovoltaic Applications," noting that chemical etching based on silver nanoparticles is a modern and very advanced method used to form nanowires on the surface of single-crystalline silicon wafers.