Motivation, benefits, and challenges for new photovoltaic material & module developments

Abstract

In the last decade and longer, photovoltaic module manufacturers have experienced a rapidly growing market along with a dramatic decrease in module prices. Such cost pressures have resulted in a drive to develop and implement new module designs, which either increase performance and/or lifetime of the modules or decrease the cost to produce them. In this paper, the main motivations and benefits but also challenges for material innovations will be discussed. Many of these innovations include the use of new and novel materials in place of more conventional materials or designs. As a result, modules are being produced and sold without a long-term understanding about the performance and reliability of these new materials. This has lead to unexpected new failure mechanisms occuring few years after deployment, such as Potential Induced Degradation or backsheet cracking. None of these failure modes have been detected after the back then common single stress tests. New accelerated test approaches are based on a combination or sequence of multiple stressors that better reflect outdoor conditions. That allows for identification of new degradation modes linked to new module materials or module designs.

Photovoltaic Materials and Their Path toward Cleaner Energy

“…Regardless of the photovoltaic material or manufacturing technology, current innovations lead to increased solar systems’ overall capacity and power output without significantly increasing the manufacturing costs. [ 21 ] Increased power for the equal amount of photovoltaic material further leads to a lower cost per kW value for new photovoltaic systems not only due to less used photovoltaic material but also other equipment (e.g., wires and junction boxes) used to convert energy inside photovoltaic material and to deliver this electricity to the grid.…”

Photonic Materials Cloud: An Online Interactive Open Tool for Creating, Comparing, and Testing Photonic Materials

“…Another important motivation for material development could be the cost and ease of material fabrication for optical application [ 31 ]. Furthermore, new materials for sustainable, reliable, low-cost, and efficient photocatalytic and photovoltaic applications are widely investigated [ 32 , 33 , 34 ]. In all of these applications, theoretical characterization of optical properties helps motivate and analyze material development [ 35 ].…”

Quantifying the influence of encapsulant and backsheet composition on PV‐power and electrical degradation

“…[7][8][9] Furthermore, this layered encapsulation structure provides mechanical stability and high functionality combined with optimised power output and electrical safety. 1,2,10 In the recent years, PV technology saw many changes, 1,10 amongst others, the rise of new cell technologies, the trend towards bigger wafer and module sizes, half cells, new interconnection approaches like shingling or multi-wires and new polyolefin-based encapsulant and backsheet films. [11][12][13][14][15][16] The main motivation and benefits for new material developments have been mainly cost reduction but also performance increase, sustainability and legal regulations as well as new technological requirements.…”

“…[11][12][13][14][15][16] The main motivation and benefits for new material developments have been mainly cost reduction but also performance increase, sustainability and legal regulations as well as new technological requirements. 1 In particular, the role of polymers in PV modules has been underestimated for a long time, as they do not play an active role in power generation itself. However, the choice of polymers has a significant influence on the properties of the PV modules not only for efficiency but more importantly for reliability, as most PV module degradation modes are directly linked to polymer degradation and material interactions with polymer components.…”

“…The development of long lifetimes is complicated further by a precedented speed of change in materials being incorporated into PV modules. 1,20 With current production capacities of around 175GW, 22 many gigawatts of modules with new technologies and materials can be produced and installed without having sufficient experience about long-term reliability. In the worst case, this has led to unexpected degradation mechanisms several years after field deployment, which were not predicted in laboratory accelerated testing, such as potential-induced degradation 23 (PID) or backsheet cracking.…”