Reliability of PV modules and balance-of-system components

Author

Dhere, Neelkanth G.

Author_Institution

Florida Solar Energy Center, Cape Canaveral, FL, USA

fYear

2005

Firstpage

1570

Lastpage

1576

Abstract

Over the years the reliability and durability of c-Si and thin-film photovoltaic (PV) modules and balance-of-system (BOS) components have improved consistently. This paper reviews performance of PV modules and BOS components and discusses the role of encapsulants, adhesional strength, impurities, metallization, solder bond integrity and breakage, corrosion, backing layers, junction boxes and high-voltage bias testing in relation to their effect on module and inverter reliability. It is suggested that the concepts of physics of reliability of electronic packages will be useful to understand, address and resolve new problems in PV module and inverter reliability.

Keywords

invertors; reliability; silicon; solar cells; thin films; PV modules; adhesional strength; backing layers; balance-of-system components; breakage; corrosion; electronic packages; encapsulants; high-voltage bias testing; impurities; inverter reliability; junction boxes; metallization; solder bond integrity; thin-film photovoltaic; Bonding; Corrosion; Impurities; Inverters; Metallization; Photovoltaic systems; Physics; Solar power generation; Testing; Transistors;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Photovoltaic Specialists Conference, 2005. Conference Record of the Thirty-first IEEE

ISSN

0160-8371

Print_ISBN

0-7803-8707-4

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/PVSC.2005.1488445

Filename

1488445