Investigation of solar cells lifetime in Iran

Abstract

Solar cells are the power production sources which work on direct radiation of the sun and must be exposed to the sun all the time. The well-known solar cell manufacturers always try to use the best material for production so that in addition to maintaining the great market of this production, protect it against harmful environmental conditions. High temperature, humidity, and air polluted with toxic and corrosive gases are the three significant factors which play an important role in degrading the performance of solar cells and cause considerable reduction in lifetime. Iran is located in a region that has the three mentioned factors. The temperature of some provinces in summer exceeds 50°C and the humidity approaches 100 percent. Toxic and corrosive gases leaked from oil wells in southern provinces of the country, while polluting the air, have undesired effects on the metallic equipment. This paper investigates the effect of temperature, humidity and toxic gases on the performance of solar cells by performing different experiments such as measuring electric parameters, ultrasonic, darkness and infrared tests, and shows the failure procedure for solar cells exposed to ambient air for 15 months in one of the provinces.