Abstract
AbstractAn inherent characteristic of high concentrator photovoltaics (HCPV) modules is a tight mechanical tolerance caused by the narrow angular transmission of the optical system, typically below or close to 1°. Misalignments in the modules caused during the assembly process in the production line will degrade not only the electrical but also the angular performance of the module. Moreover, dispersion in the electrical characteristics of the elementary units comprising a module would lead also to power loss. Quality control and data analysis on the production line is of great significance for adjusting the production line and preserving the angular tolerance and the electrical performance. This is particularly critical during the set‐up and tuning of an automated production line. This paper presents the results of a pilot production line for HCPV modules carried out within the European funded ECOSOLE project. Several quality controls were established, which are the binning of the photovoltaic receivers, the measurement of misalignments among the elementary units within every module, and the indoor electrical characterization of the modules. Collected experimental data during the tuning phase of the pilot line were used to validate a module performance model based on production parameters. Monte Carlo method is lately applied to the model to assess the influence of production defects of diverse nature and the adequacy of quality controls, in several manufacturing scenarios beyond the specific constrains of the ECOSOLE experience.
Highlights
The concentrator photovoltaic (CPV) module performance is governed by its subparts, namely the optical system [1] and the Photovoltaic (PV) solar cells [2], by means of the optical and the electrical efficiencies, respectively [3]
We study several critical manufacturing stages in which may be positive to perform some kind of measurement or quality control to keep a high module efficiency: binning of photovoltaic receivers prior to module assembly, misalignments and/or acceptance angle (AA) control and electrical characterization of modules
A model has been developed to generate module IV curves, and it has been applied to the case of a real pilot production line and showed good agreement with experimental data
Summary
The concentrator photovoltaic (CPV) module performance is governed by its subparts, namely the optical system [1] and the Photovoltaic (PV) solar cells [2], by means of the optical and the electrical efficiencies, respectively [3]. The installed equipment and the quality control procedures implemented in the pilot production line of ECOSOLE project are described in Section “Quality control and assembly line at ECOSOLE project” This includes the binning of solar cell receivers, the measurements of the misalignments among elementary units within every module, and the electrical characterization of the manufactured CPV modules. The lack of light uniformity provided by the solar simulator at the module aperture has been included in the simulation, and modeled as a loss factor following a Gaussian distribution of σN-U = 2.5% For this particular moment during the tuning of ECOSOLE production line, simulation predicts that the binning of receivers has only a slight effect (lower than 1%) on the module power generation if comparing average Pmp. In the ECOSOLE production line, the module performance is clearly dominated by misalignments among units.
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