Reducing the silver consumption of photovoltaics (PV) is a major aspect in recent solar cell research. For bifacial PERC+ solar cells silver is used for the front contact. On the rear side aluminum metallization provides the contact to the silicon. The native oxide of aluminum prohibits a standard soldering process. Therefore, rear side silver pads are typically used for the cell-to-cell interconnections with copper wires. Silver can be avoided when using ultrasonic soldering for wetting the aluminum metallization to form tin solder pads. We demonstrate mechanically stable soldering of interconnects to the silver-free solder pads with a median adhesion up to 3 N/mm. We observe a penetration of the native aluminum oxide layer by the ultrasonic tinning process and the formation of metal-to-metal contacts from the aluminum to the solder. Resistance measurements demonstrate a reduced series resistance of the ultrasonically prepared contact when compared with using silver pads. For PERC+ cells, we can thus fully avoid rear side silver pads for a standard stringing process to reduce the silver consumption by 20%–40%. We fabricate mini modules that reach the same efficiency as reference modules with standard silver pads on the rear. The efficiency degradation of the modules with the ultrasonic interconnection is less than 3.6% after 200 humidity-freeze cycles and less than 2.2% after 600 temperature cycles.
{"title":"Ultrasonic Tinning of Al Busbars for a Silver-Free Rear Side on Bifacial Silicon Solar Cells","authors":"Malte Brinkmann;Thomas Daschinger;Rolf Brendel;Henning Schulte-Huxel","doi":"10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3533901","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3533901","url":null,"abstract":"Reducing the silver consumption of photovoltaics (PV) is a major aspect in recent solar cell research. For bifacial PERC+ solar cells silver is used for the front contact. On the rear side aluminum metallization provides the contact to the silicon. The native oxide of aluminum prohibits a standard soldering process. Therefore, rear side silver pads are typically used for the cell-to-cell interconnections with copper wires. Silver can be avoided when using ultrasonic soldering for wetting the aluminum metallization to form tin solder pads. We demonstrate mechanically stable soldering of interconnects to the silver-free solder pads with a median adhesion up to 3 N/mm. We observe a penetration of the native aluminum oxide layer by the ultrasonic tinning process and the formation of metal-to-metal contacts from the aluminum to the solder. Resistance measurements demonstrate a reduced series resistance of the ultrasonically prepared contact when compared with using silver pads. For PERC+ cells, we can thus fully avoid rear side silver pads for a standard stringing process to reduce the silver consumption by 20%–40%. We fabricate mini modules that reach the same efficiency as reference modules with standard silver pads on the rear. The efficiency degradation of the modules with the ultrasonic interconnection is less than 3.6% after 200 humidity-freeze cycles and less than 2.2% after 600 temperature cycles.","PeriodicalId":445,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics","volume":"15 2","pages":"244-251"},"PeriodicalIF":2.5,"publicationDate":"2025-02-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143455265","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-02-06DOI: 10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3519616
David Quispe;Brendan Eng;Mijung Kim;Brian J. Coppa;Minjoo L. Lee;Zachary C. Holman
The parasitic absorption of visible light in amorphous silicon layers can result in a short-circuit current density (Jsc) loss of up to 2 mA/cm2 for silicon heterojunction solar cells. To mitigate this issue, we explore the potential for polycrystalline Al0.25Ga0.75P and Al0.9Ga0.1As, both nonepitaxially deposited at 250 °C, to enable high Jsc while serving as alternative hole contacts to p-type amorphous silicon [a-Si:H(p)]. Using a suite of device characterization methods, we investigate how the passivation changes with the deposition of these III–V materials and their degree of hole selectivity. We identify that both Al0.25Ga0.75P and Al0.9Ga0.1As can still enable high implied open-circuit voltages >720 mV; however, they are not hole selective enough to enable high open-circuit voltage and fill factor. Ultimately, the best performing solar cells are limited to 9.6% and 10.8% efficiency with a nominal 5 nm of Al0.25Ga0.75P and a measured 13 nm of Al0.9Ga0.1As, respectively. However, both cells demonstrate higher Jsc than a reference cell with a-Si:H(p) that has a similar nominal thickness.
{"title":"Evaluating the Potential of Polycrystalline Al0.25Ga0.75P and Al0.9Ga0.1As as Hole Contacts in Silicon Heterojunction Solar Cells","authors":"David Quispe;Brendan Eng;Mijung Kim;Brian J. Coppa;Minjoo L. Lee;Zachary C. Holman","doi":"10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3519616","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3519616","url":null,"abstract":"The parasitic absorption of visible light in amorphous silicon layers can result in a short-circuit current density (<italic>J</i><sub>sc</sub>) loss of up to 2 mA/cm<sup>2</sup> for silicon heterojunction solar cells. To mitigate this issue, we explore the potential for polycrystalline Al<sub>0.25</sub>Ga<sub>0.75</sub>P and Al<sub>0.9</sub>Ga<sub>0.1</sub>As, both <italic>nonepitaxially</i> deposited at 250 °C, to enable high <italic>J</i><sub>sc</sub> while serving as alternative hole contacts to p-type amorphous silicon [a-Si:H(p)]. Using a suite of device characterization methods, we investigate how the passivation changes with the deposition of these III–V materials and their degree of hole selectivity. We identify that both Al<sub>0.25</sub>Ga<sub>0.75</sub>P and Al<sub>0.9</sub>Ga<sub>0.1</sub>As can still enable high implied open-circuit voltages >720 mV; however, they are not hole selective enough to enable high open-circuit voltage and fill factor. Ultimately, the best performing solar cells are limited to 9.6% and 10.8% efficiency with a nominal 5 nm of Al<sub>0.25</sub>Ga<sub>0.75</sub>P and a measured 13 nm of Al<sub>0.9</sub>Ga<sub>0.1</sub>As, respectively. However, both cells demonstrate higher <italic>J</i><sub>sc</sub> than a reference cell with a-Si:H(p) that has a similar nominal thickness.","PeriodicalId":445,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics","volume":"15 2","pages":"223-232"},"PeriodicalIF":2.5,"publicationDate":"2025-02-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143455250","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Perovskite photovoltaic (PV) cells have achieved a record 26.7% efficiency, but improvements in stability against humidity, temperature shifts, and light exposure remain crucial. In this work, we explored mesoporous carbon-based perovskite (c-PSC) devices because of carbon's stability and the elimination of a heat-sensitive hole transport layer. Encapsulation materials exhibiting promising properties with silicon PV, including a thermoplastic polyolefin encapsulant, were applied under different lamination conditions to investigate the impact on c-PSC devices’ durability, which is a novel study for this specific combination of materials. Inadequate curing can compromise adhesion, reduce moisture resistance, and accelerate perovskite decomposition under light exposure. Increasing the lamination temperature by 20 °C allowed samples to withstand 1000 h of damp-heat conditions, with a 30% reduction in efficiency, while lower temperature lamination caused immediate performance drops. While light exposure remained highly degrading, higher lamination temperatures delayed damage, preserving 2.5% of the initial power conversion efficiency after 400 h of aging and slowing perovskite decomposition.
{"title":"Impact of Encapsulation Processing Conditions on Degradation Mechanisms of Carbon-Based Perovskite Solar Cells","authors":"Nikoleta Kyranaki;Cynthia Farha;Lara Perrin;Lionel Flandin;Emilie Planès;Lukas Wagner;David Martineau;Stéphane Cros","doi":"10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3533909","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3533909","url":null,"abstract":"Perovskite photovoltaic (PV) cells have achieved a record 26.7% efficiency, but improvements in stability against humidity, temperature shifts, and light exposure remain crucial. In this work, we explored mesoporous carbon-based perovskite (c-PSC) devices because of carbon's stability and the elimination of a heat-sensitive hole transport layer. Encapsulation materials exhibiting promising properties with silicon PV, including a thermoplastic polyolefin encapsulant, were applied under different lamination conditions to investigate the impact on c-PSC devices’ durability, which is a novel study for this specific combination of materials. Inadequate curing can compromise adhesion, reduce moisture resistance, and accelerate perovskite decomposition under light exposure. Increasing the lamination temperature by 20 °C allowed samples to withstand 1000 h of damp-heat conditions, with a 30% reduction in efficiency, while lower temperature lamination caused immediate performance drops. While light exposure remained highly degrading, higher lamination temperatures delayed damage, preserving 2.5% of the initial power conversion efficiency after 400 h of aging and slowing perovskite decomposition.","PeriodicalId":445,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics","volume":"15 2","pages":"261-267"},"PeriodicalIF":2.5,"publicationDate":"2025-02-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143455252","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-02-03DOI: 10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3531043
Gabriel Lopez;Arman Aghahosseini;Dmitrii Bogdanov;Rasul Satymov;Ayobami Solomon Oyewo;Christian Breyer
The transition to highly sustainable energy industry systems is being driven by significant growth in solar photovoltaics (PV). Despite targets to reach net-zero emissions by 2050, fossil fuels still dominate the energy industry systems in the USA and Canada. Transition pathways are developed and analyzed comparing a complete defossilization of both energy and nonenergy demands with business-as-usual conditions based on government projections. The results demonstrate the benefits of transitioning to 100% renewable energy for all sectors, as excess low-cost electricity from solar PV can be used for power-to-X solutions to produce electricity-based fuels, chemicals, and materials. By 2050, the power sector will only consume 20% of generated electricity, with the remaining used to electrify the heat, transport, and industry sectors. Thus, 86% of all primary energy in the system comes from renewable electricity, as total electricity generation increases from 4394 TWh in 2020 to 20 795 TWh in 2050. Solar PV reaches 78% of all electricity generation, leading to 10.6 TW of installed capacity. The full energy industry sector transition leads to reductions in both levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) and levelized cost of final energy (LCOFE). The LCOE sees massive reductions from 72 €/MWh in 2020 to 25 €/MWh in 2050, and the LCOFE decreases from the current 50 to 41 €/MWh in 2050. The strong operational synergies between solar PV and flexible electrolysis enable a transition pathway that demonstrates the viability of a Power-to-X Economy in achieving climate targets of net-zero emissions. The high share of solar PV indicates a Solar-to-X Economy characteristic.
{"title":"Sustainable Energy Industry Systems in the United States and Canada Demonstrating the Value of Solar-to-X","authors":"Gabriel Lopez;Arman Aghahosseini;Dmitrii Bogdanov;Rasul Satymov;Ayobami Solomon Oyewo;Christian Breyer","doi":"10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3531043","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3531043","url":null,"abstract":"The transition to highly sustainable energy industry systems is being driven by significant growth in solar photovoltaics (PV). Despite targets to reach net-zero emissions by 2050, fossil fuels still dominate the energy industry systems in the USA and Canada. Transition pathways are developed and analyzed comparing a complete defossilization of both energy and nonenergy demands with business-as-usual conditions based on government projections. The results demonstrate the benefits of transitioning to 100% renewable energy for all sectors, as excess low-cost electricity from solar PV can be used for power-to-X solutions to produce electricity-based fuels, chemicals, and materials. By 2050, the power sector will only consume 20% of generated electricity, with the remaining used to electrify the heat, transport, and industry sectors. Thus, 86% of all primary energy in the system comes from renewable electricity, as total electricity generation increases from 4394 TWh in 2020 to 20 795 TWh in 2050. Solar PV reaches 78% of all electricity generation, leading to 10.6 TW of installed capacity. The full energy industry sector transition leads to reductions in both levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) and levelized cost of final energy (LCOFE). The LCOE sees massive reductions from 72 €/MWh in 2020 to 25 €/MWh in 2050, and the LCOFE decreases from the current 50 to 41 €/MWh in 2050. The strong operational synergies between solar PV and flexible electrolysis enable a transition pathway that demonstrates the viability of a Power-to-X Economy in achieving climate targets of net-zero emissions. The high share of solar PV indicates a Solar-to-X Economy characteristic.","PeriodicalId":445,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics","volume":"15 2","pages":"215-222"},"PeriodicalIF":2.5,"publicationDate":"2025-02-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=10869466","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143455098","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-01-20DOI: 10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3526170
Elizabeth C. Palmiotti;Martin Springer;Jarett Zuboy;Timothy J. Silverman;Jennifer L. Braid;Dirk C. Jordan;Salil Rabade;Teresa M. Barnes
Photovoltaic (PV) module materials and technologies continue to evolve as module manufacturers and buyers try to minimize costs, maximize performance, and speed deployment. Both silicon and thin film modules are converging toward similar ∼3 $text{m}^{2}$ glass–glass designs with thinner glass sheets to increase power output while reducing module weight, and both types are increasingly mounted on single-axis trackers. At the same time, an increasing number of PV sites have been reporting spontaneous glass breakage in early life systems deployed with these “big, floppy modules.” In this article, we identify the concurrent module changes that may be contributing to increased early failure, explain the trends, and discuss their reliability implications. We suggest that larger, thinner glass sheets along with variations in heat treatment and quality may be contributing to glass vulnerability. We note that trends toward weaker or back-mounted frames may also be contributing to module failures, especially for “extra-extra-large” modules mounted on trackers. Combinations of these trends may have pushed modules to a threshold at which increasing early failures are causing the front edge of the “bathtub curve” to re-emerge. Current qualification testing appears to be ineffective for catching these early failures in new module designs, and module buyers do not have enough reliability information—or cannot prioritize such information—during module procurement. Additional research is needed to identify the field conditions leading to glass breakage and if there is one or multiple limiting flaws in new module designs causing glass breakage. Early failures may be mitigated by returning to more robust designs or ensuring better module testing and quality assurance.
{"title":"Growing Panes: Investigating the PV Technology Trends Behind Frequent Early Failures in Modern Glass–Glass Modules","authors":"Elizabeth C. Palmiotti;Martin Springer;Jarett Zuboy;Timothy J. Silverman;Jennifer L. Braid;Dirk C. Jordan;Salil Rabade;Teresa M. Barnes","doi":"10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3526170","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3526170","url":null,"abstract":"Photovoltaic (PV) module materials and technologies continue to evolve as module manufacturers and buyers try to minimize costs, maximize performance, and speed deployment. Both silicon and thin film modules are converging toward similar ∼3 <inline-formula><tex-math>$text{m}^{2}$</tex-math></inline-formula> glass–glass designs with thinner glass sheets to increase power output while reducing module weight, and both types are increasingly mounted on single-axis trackers. At the same time, an increasing number of PV sites have been reporting spontaneous glass breakage in early life systems deployed with these “big, floppy modules.” In this article, we identify the concurrent module changes that may be contributing to increased early failure, explain the trends, and discuss their reliability implications. We suggest that larger, thinner glass sheets along with variations in heat treatment and quality may be contributing to glass vulnerability. We note that trends toward weaker or back-mounted frames may also be contributing to module failures, especially for “extra-extra-large” modules mounted on trackers. Combinations of these trends may have pushed modules to a threshold at which increasing early failures are causing the front edge of the “bathtub curve” to re-emerge. Current qualification testing appears to be ineffective for catching these early failures in new module designs, and module buyers do not have enough reliability information—or cannot prioritize such information—during module procurement. Additional research is needed to identify the field conditions leading to glass breakage and if there is one or multiple limiting flaws in new module designs causing glass breakage. Early failures may be mitigated by returning to more robust designs or ensuring better module testing and quality assurance.","PeriodicalId":445,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics","volume":"15 2","pages":"297-308"},"PeriodicalIF":2.5,"publicationDate":"2025-01-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=10847304","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143455101","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The accumulation of dust and dirt on solar photovoltaic (PV) panels, known as soiling, reduces energy generation and conversion efficiency of a PV plant. Therefore, regular cleaning is essential to maintain optimal plant performance and economic viability. Fixed-interval cleaning schedules become uneconomical during periods such as low-insolation, rainy, or cloudy events. This study proposes a data-driven method to estimate the soiling ratio (SR) for a 504-kWp rooftop PV plant in India using power, temperature, and irradiance data. A PV panel temperature estimation model is employed, based on ambient temperature and solar irradiance, which simplifies the process by eliminating the need for direct temperature measurements. The analysis reveals that regular cleaning is essential despite rainfall, with energy losses due to soiling ranging from 32% to 47% across inverters, with soiling rates of 4.6–5.5% per day. A dynamic cleaning schedule, considering weather and soiling conditions, was developed to reduce these losses. Economic evaluation demonstrated that manual cleaning following the proposed dynamic schedule is cost effective, with profit margins of 48–77%, comparing energy gain and cleaning cost. Compared with fixed-interval cleaning, the proposed method maintained the same average SR but yielded 25–49% higher profitability across inverters.
{"title":"Data-Driven Soiling Estimation and Optimized Cleaning Strategies for Industrial Rooftop PV Systems","authors":"Ankit Pal;Saravana Ilango Ganesan;Maddikara Jaya Bharata Reddy","doi":"10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3527124","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/JPHOTOV.2025.3527124","url":null,"abstract":"The accumulation of dust and dirt on solar photovoltaic (PV) panels, known as soiling, reduces energy generation and conversion efficiency of a PV plant. Therefore, regular cleaning is essential to maintain optimal plant performance and economic viability. Fixed-interval cleaning schedules become uneconomical during periods such as low-insolation, rainy, or cloudy events. This study proposes a data-driven method to estimate the soiling ratio (SR) for a 504-kWp rooftop PV plant in India using power, temperature, and irradiance data. A PV panel temperature estimation model is employed, based on ambient temperature and solar irradiance, which simplifies the process by eliminating the need for direct temperature measurements. The analysis reveals that regular cleaning is essential despite rainfall, with energy losses due to soiling ranging from 32% to 47% across inverters, with soiling rates of 4.6–5.5% per day. A dynamic cleaning schedule, considering weather and soiling conditions, was developed to reduce these losses. Economic evaluation demonstrated that manual cleaning following the proposed dynamic schedule is cost effective, with profit margins of 48–77%, comparing energy gain and cleaning cost. Compared with fixed-interval cleaning, the proposed method maintained the same average SR but yielded 25–49% higher profitability across inverters.","PeriodicalId":445,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics","volume":"15 2","pages":"353-361"},"PeriodicalIF":2.5,"publicationDate":"2025-01-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143455249","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-01-09DOI: 10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3523546
Chiara Barretta;Astrid E. Macher;Marc Köntges;Julian Ascencio-Vásquez;Marko Topič;Gernot Oreski
A damage analysis was conducted on photovoltaic modules with identical bill of materials exposed to different climates: Cfb moderate and Af tropical, according to the Köppen-Geiger climate classification. The combination of high temperature, relative humidity, and high ultraviolet (UV) radiation was the cause of severe degradation for the modules exposed to tropical climates (TR), whereas the module exposed to a moderate climate did not experience a significant loss in performance. The modules installed in TR, on the contrary, showed significant power degradation after approximately 8 years of exposure, primarily attributed to acetic acid-related degradation modes. Encapsulant samples were extracted from the selected modules and characterized to determine changes in chemical structure, thermal stability, and consumption of additives and stabilizers. The results of qualitative additive analysis showed that the UV absorber was no longer detectable in the front encapsulant extracted from modules exposed in TR. The consumption of the stabilizers was considered as the main cause of reduction of molar mass. The presence of acetic acid was evident in both electroluminescence images and ion chromatography results. While differential scanning calorimetry successfully detected a reduction in molar mass, thermogravimetric analysis, and infrared spectroscopy proved unsuitable for identifying chain scission phenomena.
{"title":"Effect of Encapsulant Degradation on Photovoltaic Modules Performances Installed in Different Climates","authors":"Chiara Barretta;Astrid E. Macher;Marc Köntges;Julian Ascencio-Vásquez;Marko Topič;Gernot Oreski","doi":"10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3523546","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3523546","url":null,"abstract":"A damage analysis was conducted on photovoltaic modules with identical bill of materials exposed to different climates: Cfb moderate and Af tropical, according to the Köppen-Geiger climate classification. The combination of high temperature, relative humidity, and high ultraviolet (UV) radiation was the cause of severe degradation for the modules exposed to tropical climates (TR), whereas the module exposed to a moderate climate did not experience a significant loss in performance. The modules installed in TR, on the contrary, showed significant power degradation after approximately 8 years of exposure, primarily attributed to acetic acid-related degradation modes. Encapsulant samples were extracted from the selected modules and characterized to determine changes in chemical structure, thermal stability, and consumption of additives and stabilizers. The results of qualitative additive analysis showed that the UV absorber was no longer detectable in the front encapsulant extracted from modules exposed in TR. The consumption of the stabilizers was considered as the main cause of reduction of molar mass. The presence of acetic acid was evident in both electroluminescence images and ion chromatography results. While differential scanning calorimetry successfully detected a reduction in molar mass, thermogravimetric analysis, and infrared spectroscopy proved unsuitable for identifying chain scission phenomena.","PeriodicalId":445,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics","volume":"15 2","pages":"290-296"},"PeriodicalIF":2.5,"publicationDate":"2025-01-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143455097","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The yield of photovoltaic (PV) modules is influenced by various environmental factors, particularly solar irradiance and temperature. However, the measured solar irradiance does not accurately represent the real light intensity absorbed by different types of solar cells, and the measured temperature does not represent the actual cell temperature in PV modules. In this article, equivalent irradiance and temperature are proposed and used to improve the accuracy of output performance estimation of PV modules. First, equivalent irradiance and temperature under different operating condition are obtained by fitting measured I–V data by using the guaranteed convergence particle swarm optimization. Second, the relationship between the equivalent irradiance and temperature and environmental factors is established by an artificial neural network (ANN) model. Two types of ANNs with different input vector are proposed to calculated equivalent irradiance and temperature. The accuracy of the proposed method was validated by experimental data for four different types of PV modules under wide operating conditions.
{"title":"A Novel Method for Performance Estimation of PV Modules Using Equivalent Irradiance and Temperature","authors":"Jinlong Zhang;Zhenguang Liang;Yunpeng Zhang;Hai Zhou;Ji Wu;Honglu Zhu","doi":"10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3521090","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3521090","url":null,"abstract":"The yield of photovoltaic (PV) modules is influenced by various environmental factors, particularly solar irradiance and temperature. However, the measured solar irradiance does not accurately represent the real light intensity absorbed by different types of solar cells, and the measured temperature does not represent the actual cell temperature in PV modules. In this article, equivalent irradiance and temperature are proposed and used to improve the accuracy of output performance estimation of PV modules. First, equivalent irradiance and temperature under different operating condition are obtained by fitting measured <italic>I–V</i> data by using the guaranteed convergence particle swarm optimization. Second, the relationship between the equivalent irradiance and temperature and environmental factors is established by an artificial neural network (ANN) model. Two types of ANNs with different input vector are proposed to calculated equivalent irradiance and temperature. The accuracy of the proposed method was validated by experimental data for four different types of PV modules under wide operating conditions.","PeriodicalId":445,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics","volume":"15 2","pages":"274-279"},"PeriodicalIF":2.5,"publicationDate":"2025-01-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143455099","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-01-09DOI: 10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3521121
Mauro Pravettoni;Min Hsian Saw;Muhammad Nabil Bin Abdul Aziz;Stephen En Rong Tay
In Part 1 of our article, we presented a method to quantify the incidence angle modifier (IAM) of photovoltaic (PV) devices, which differs from the methods proposed in IEC 61853-2 through the following: it utilizes a spot-area irradiation, delivered by an optical fiber system, a customized angle probe holder, and a current-to-voltage converter. Part 1 focused on single-cell devices and presented the validation of the new method on two different cell architectures. In Part 2, we generalize that method to commercial-size silicon PV modules, mirroring by the approach already used for module-level spectral responsivity measurements described in IEC 60904-8:2014. The proposed method is motivated by inclusion in the currently ongoing revision of IEC 61853-2, providing research centers and testing laboratories with an additional option to perform IAM measurements indoors. The reproducibility of the proposed method is addressed in this work via interlaboratory comparison with a different measurement method for the same quantity and with a detailed uncertainty analysis.
{"title":"A Spot-Area Method to Evaluate the Incidence Angle Modifier of Photovoltaic Devices-Part 2: Modules (Differential Method)","authors":"Mauro Pravettoni;Min Hsian Saw;Muhammad Nabil Bin Abdul Aziz;Stephen En Rong Tay","doi":"10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3521121","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3521121","url":null,"abstract":"In Part 1 of our article, we presented a method to quantify the incidence angle modifier (IAM) of photovoltaic (PV) devices, which differs from the methods proposed in IEC 61853-2 through the following: it utilizes a spot-area irradiation, delivered by an optical fiber system, a customized angle probe holder, and a current-to-voltage converter. Part 1 focused on single-cell devices and presented the validation of the new method on two different cell architectures. In Part 2, we generalize that method to commercial-size silicon PV modules, mirroring by the approach already used for module-level spectral responsivity measurements described in IEC 60904-8:2014. The proposed method is motivated by inclusion in the currently ongoing revision of IEC 61853-2, providing research centers and testing laboratories with an additional option to perform IAM measurements indoors. The reproducibility of the proposed method is addressed in this work via interlaboratory comparison with a different measurement method for the same quantity and with a detailed uncertainty analysis.","PeriodicalId":445,"journal":{"name":"IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics","volume":"15 2","pages":"280-289"},"PeriodicalIF":2.5,"publicationDate":"2025-01-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143455240","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-01-06DOI: 10.1109/JPHOTOV.2024.3521089
Jeremiah Reagan;Brandi McKuin;Sarah Kurtz
In this article, we assessed five reflector materials for hypothetical vertical bifacial arrays as a solar canal technology option. We screened the materials (CoverMax, CoverTuff, polyvinyl chloride (PVC) Poly, polyester canvas, and Vivosun aluminized Mylar) for reflectivity, tensile strength to minimum mounting load, vapor barrier performance to reduce evaporation, and energy production. Vivosun had the highest reflectivity (albedo of 0.87–0.93) and increased annual energy production more than 40% compared with a system without reflector, but plastically deformed under tensile strength testing. All materials reduced evaporation at least fivefold compared with the control. Following our preliminary assessment, we calculated the levelized cost of electricity of a hypothetical vertical bifacial array with two height configurations (short system at 2 m and tall system at 3 m) and four hybrid reflectors (fabricated from strong base layer materials with a top layer of Vivosun) and compared these results with systems with single-material reflectors and with systems without reflectors. We found that the tall system with a hybrid reflector made from PVC Poly had the lowest levelized cost of electricity. However, when considering other performance metrics, such as tensile strength and vapor barrier performance, a hybrid reflector made from CoverMax emerged as the best candidate of the options considered.
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