The PV module price has had a sharp decline since 2010 so that it has dropped more than 80% over the last decade [1]. This drastic decline is partly due to the constant pressure on PV module manufacturers to reduce the Levelized Cost of Electricity (LCOE) of solar power plants, especially photovoltaic ones. Such cost pressures have resulted in a drive to develop and implement new module designs, which either increase the performance and/or the lifetime of modules or decrease the cost to produce them [2]. Introducing new encapsulation materials is a measure leading to the two above-mentioned results at the same time.
There is a famous Golden triangle in the PV module production that scientific researchers and PV module manufacturers consider to assess the technical feasibility and commercialization capability of encapsulants in the destination market [3,4]: Price, Performance, and Efficiency. The low cost, lightweight, flexibility, and easier assembly of polymeric materials have made them the most widely used material in PV module encapsulation.
Ethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA) is the mainstream encapsulation material for commercial use due to its low cost, adequate transparency, and flexibility since 1981 [5, 6, 7]. Although EVA has had a long-established history in PV module manufacturing, it is prone to acetic acid formation and having a high water vapor transmission rate. They lead to several serious failures and degrade the PV module performance during service life including discoloration, corrosion of metallization on top of the solar cells, delamination, and bubble formation [8, 9, 10].
PV modules have been designed for being on operation for 25-30 years while such deteriorating failures jeopardize the PV module performance and lifetime during the first years of their operation and bring them to their end of life sooner than expected. Therefore, there is an emergent need to develop and implement new encapsulants not only to guarantee the specified service life of PV modules but also to reduce the cost of production of them more than before.
As two alternatives for EVA, researchers have focused on thermoplastic polyolefin (TPO) and polyvinyl butyral (PVB). TPO is more famous than PVB for its better results under accelerated aging tests comparing to EVA [2]. Moreover, TPO has become one of the mainstream materials for glass-glass PV modules which is fit for hot and humid installation locations, thanks to its higher thermal stability and lower water vapor transmission rate as compared to EVA and PVB. These three and sometimes a combination type of EVA and TPO are under hot debate as encapsulation materials for PV modules.
It is important to note that each of the alternative materials for EVA has its own advantages and disadvantages. But there is an unwritten checklist for comparing different encapsulants and choosing the better ones in this segment of the industry, as we said about glass-glass PV modules. In other words, using a general bill of material (BOM) for PV module manufacturing is gradually faded away, oriented and specific BOM for PV production has found its position instead.
The story is continued in the next part.
Did you know?
Solar Edition publishes the top 10 solar panels monthly since 2019. In addition to this, we also publish a top 10 72 cells solar panels for industrial-scale every quarterly (Q1,2,3,4)
Reference
- IRENA (2020), Renewable Power Generation Costs in 2019, International Renewable Energy Agency, Abu Dhabi.
- Oreski, Gernot, Joshua Stein, Gabriele Eder, Karl Berger, Laura S. Bruckman, Jan Vedde, Karl-Anders Weiss, Tadanori Tanahashi, Roger H. French, and Samuli Ranta. Designing New Materials for Photovoltaics: Opportunities for Lowering Cost and Increasing Performance through Advanced Material Innovations. No. SAND2021-4837R. Sandia National Lab.(SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States), 2021.
- Meng, Lei, Jingbi You, and Yang Yang. “Addressing the stability issue of perovskite solar cells for commercial applications.” Nature communications 9, no. 1 (2018): 1-4.
- Yeo, Jun-Seok, and Yeseul Jeong. “Pathway toward market entry of perovskite solar cells: A detailed study on the research trends and collaboration networks through bibliometrics.” Energy Reports 6 (2020): 2075-2085.
- Oreski, Gernot, Antonia Omazic, Gabriele Christine Eder, Yuliya Voronko, Lukas Neumaier, Wolfgang Mühleisen, Christina Hirschl, Gusztáv Ujvari, Rita Ebner, and Michaell Edler. “Properties and degradation behaviour of polyolefin encapsulants for photovoltaic modules.” Progress in Photovoltaics: Research and Applications 28, no. 12 (2020): 1277-1288.
- Hsu, Hsien-Yi, Hsin-Hsin Hsieh, Hsing-Yu Tuan, and Jen-Loong Hwang. “Oxidized low density polyethylene: A potential cost-effective, stable, and recyclable polymeric encapsulant for photovoltaic modules.” Solar energy materials and solar cells 94, no. 6 (2010): 955-959.
- Klemchuk, Peter, Myer Ezrin, Gary Lavigne, William Holley, James Galica, and Susan Agro. “Investigation of the degradation and stabilization of EVA-based encapsulant in field-aged solar energy modules.” Polymer degradation and stability 55, no. 3 (1997): 347-365.
- Hasan, Osama, and A. F. M. Arif. “Performance and life prediction model for photovoltaic modules: Effect of encapsulant constitutive behavior.” Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells 122 (2014): 75-87.
- Adothu, Baloji, Sudhanshu Mallick, and Purnendu Kartikay. “Determination of Crystallinity, Composition, and Thermal stability of Ethylene Vinyl Acetate Encapsulant used for PV Module Lamination.” In 2019 IEEE 46th Photovoltaic Specialists Conference (PVSC), pp. 0491-0494. IEEE, 2019.
- Swonke, Thomas, and Richard Auer. “Impact of moisture on PV module encapsulants.” In Reliability of Photovoltaic Cells, Modules, Components, and Systems II, vol. 7412, p. 74120A. International Society for Optics and Photonics, 2009.
