Modelling of the Encapsulation Factors for Photovoltaic Modules

The actual silicon crisis in photovoltaic industry forces the whole value chain to realize more installed W_p photovoltaic power out of every kg silicon. This is approached through thinner wafers by the wafer producers, higher cell efficiencies by the cell manufacturers, and efficiency enhancements via improved encapsulation schemes at module production. Recently, some alternative encapsulation materials came in consideration, e.g. EVA replacements and cover glass with anti-reflective coatings. Cell technologies are changing as well. Some innovations are already adopted in standard products, but need to be tuned to each other. While the number of parameters involved has increased, it became cumbersome to minimize the optical losses experimentally. Modelling and variation of those parameters is performed to understand their interdependence and to propose optimal parameters sets, which can be used as good starting parameters for experimental probing