Fleet-Scale Energy-Yield Degradation Analysis Applied to Hundreds of Residential and Nonresidential Photovoltaic Systems
- National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
- kWh Analytics, San Francisco, CA (United States)
We apply open-source calculations (RdTools) to performance data from more than 500 photovoltaic systems in the United States to quantify photovoltaic energy-yield degradation rates. We find that the residential systems considered in this study tended to show more system energy-yield degradation than the nonresidential systems considered here. Within the nonresidential systems, we find differences in the degradation rates associated with module technology - namely, that systems built with interdigitated-back-contact module technology tended to show slower degradation than conventional silicon or silicon heterojunction modules. We also find that in older nonresidential systems, degradation proceeded more rapidly later in system life. Within the residential systems considered here, we find that those exposed to more shade tended to show more rapid energy-yield degradation. Finally, considering both residential and nonresidential systems, we observe that higher operating temperature is correlated with more rapid degradation. The fleet-scale analysis demonstrated here highlights the importance of using a robust scalable analysis to consider large numbers of systems in order to identify factors associated with degradation risk.
- Research Organization:
- National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Renewable Power Office. Solar Energy Technologies Office
- Grant/Contract Number:
- AC36-08GO28308
- OSTI ID:
- 1501657
- Report Number(s):
- NREL/JA-5K00-72979
- Journal Information:
- IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics, Vol. 9, Issue 2; ISSN 2156-3381
- Publisher:
- IEEECopyright Statement
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Web of Science
Reliable long-term performance assessment of commercial photovoltaic modules tested under field conditions over 5 years
|
journal | November 2019 |
Solar surfaces: A bad idea or tomorrow’s mainstream application?
|
journal | January 2019 |
Similar Records
Reducing Uncertainty of Fielded Photovoltaic Performance (Final Technical Report)
Impact of undoped substrates on high performance silicon solar cells