Abstract
Life cycle metrics evolution specific to the climate zone of photovoltaic (PV) operation would give detailed insights on the environmental and economic performance. At present, vast literature is available on the PV life cycle metrics where only the output energies ignoring the degradation rate (DR) influence. In this study, the environ-economic analysis of three PV technologies, namely, multi-crystalline silicon (mc-Si), amorphous silicon (a-Si) and hetero-junction with an intrinsic thin layer (HIT) have been carried out in identical environmental conditions. The energy performance parameters and the DR rate of three PV technologies are evaluated based on the monitored real time data from the installation site in hot semi-arid climates. The assessment demonstrates that the HIT PV module technology exhibits more suitable results compared to mc-Si and a-Si PV systems in hot semi-arid climatic conditions of India. Moreover, energy metrices which includes energy payback time (EPBT), energy production factor (EPF) and life cycle conversion efficiency (LCCE) of the HIT technologies are found to be 1.0, 24.93 and 0.15 years, respectively. HIT PV system has higher potential to mitigate the CO2 and carbon credit earned compared to mc-Si and a-Si PV system under hot semi-arid climate. However, the annualized uniform cost (UAC) for mc-Si (3.60 Rs/kWh) and a-Si (3.40 Rs/kWh) are more admissible in relation to the HIT (6.63 Rs/kWh) PV module type. We conclude that the approach of considering DR influenced life cycle metrics over the traditional approach can support to identify suitable locations for specific PV technology.
Highlights
The world is moving towards carbon emission reduction from the environment
Pacca et al [9] investigated two types of technologies, namely amorphous silicon (a-Si) and multi-crystalline silicon (mc-Si); and the results show the energy payback time (EPBT) and carbon dioxide (CO2) emission of the a-Si and mc-Si are 1.6, 5.7 years and 34.3 and 72.4g of CO2/kWh, respectively
In order to investigate the life cycle parameters, the present analysis considers the end of life as 30 years and a linear degradation rate of the PV module of 0.5%/year
Summary
After the Paris agreement in 2015, it was decided to maintain an earth environment average temperature increase below 2 ◦C above pre-industrial levels and undertake rapid global emission reductions [1]. Energy sector is the one that greatly effects the earth’s environment and has a considerable share of global carbon emission. The total installed capacity of different PV systems has increased up to 415 GW till August 2018 [2]. India has increased its installed capacity for grid-connected and off-grid-connected PV systems up to 24,582.23 MW and 843.11 MW, respectively, as of 30 March 2017 [3,4]. The weather parameters are responsible for the performance degradation in PV modules. Degradation of different technologies’ PV modules is one of the major issues to increase their lifetime. It is understood that electricity produced from the PV plants is not constant and on long run there will be decline in a produced electricity
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