Failure modes and effect analysis of module level power electronics

The scope for module level power electronics (MLPE) is immense in modern day PV industry but it lacks in assessing the reliability. This paper presents the work performed by PREDICTS (Physics of Reliability: Evaluating Design Insights for Component Technologies in Solar) team lead by Sandia National Laboratories to develop a standard reliability assessment protocol for MLPE including microinverters and microconverters. This paper discusses the ground work performed to develop the reliability assessment protocol by conducting FMEA (Failure Mode Effect & Analysis) and identify the top five failure modes that drive to the development of accelerated test similar to the existing PV module and power electronics industries.