Effect of shading caused by dust on Cadmium Telluride photovoltaic modules

Author

Qasem, H. ; Betts, T.R. ; Gottschalg, R.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electron. & Electr. Eng., Loughborough Univ., Loughborough, UK

fYear

2011

fDate

19-24 June 2011

Abstract

The effect of dust on Cadmium-Telluride photovoltaic (PV) thin film modules is investigated by the application of a spatial 3 dimensional model developed with the circuit analysis software PSPICE. The effect of dust concentration and tilt angle variation on the PV module´s performance was investigated. The probability of hotspots in different installation positions is investigated. The simulation results showed a reduction in the sample´s performance with increased dust concentration and reduced tilt angle. The variation between cell positions showed that a horizontal orientation of the cells has an increased risk of hotspots with cells with localized lower parallel resistances than cells identified with uniform high parallel resistance.

Keywords

II-VI semiconductors; SPICE; cadmium compounds; dust; electric resistance; electrical installation; probability; semiconductor thin films; solar cells; wide band gap semiconductors; CdTe; PSPICE; PV modules; cadmium-telluride photovoltaic thin film modules; circuit analysis software; dust concentration effect; dust shading effect; horizontal cell orientation; hotspots probability; installation positions; localized lower parallel resistances; performance reduction; spatial three-dimensional model; tilt angle variation; uniform high parallel resistance; Limiting; Materials; Mathematical model; Resistance; Schottky diodes; Short circuit currents;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Photovoltaic Specialists Conference (PVSC), 2011 37th IEEE

Conference_Location

Seattle, WA

ISSN

0160-8371

Print_ISBN

978-1-4244-9966-3

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/PVSC.2011.6186620

Filename

6186620