Maximum Power determination for PV module manufacturers
Getting it right every time
PV module manufacturers are facing challenges
Manufacturers want to squeeze every watt out of a module. Repeatable measurements of the true Pmax are critical to make this happen. New technologies require solar simulators with high accuracy to fully yield the energy potential of a module.
- The price pressure limits the maximum allowable OPEX and CAPEX
- Fast process adaption is required for new PV module technologies
- Need for control of the entire measurement system (calibration module, procedures, training, environment, simulator, samples)
- When high reproducibility is not achieved there is no data correlation between production lines and plants
- Low repeatability can result in discussions with EPC on module data
- If measurement uncertainty is high, can cause 2% loss of value down the value chain
Eternalsun Spire manufacturing solar simulators enable high accuracy and low cost of ownership
Evolution of Spire flash solar simulators
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1982
- The worldwide PV module production exceeds 21 MW. Spire develops a tower flasher (SPI-SUN 240) to test c-Si modules
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1995
- Spire moves to tabletop solar simulators for better uniformity and usability (SPI-SUN 460i). The worldwide PV production reaches 1 GW and the market is dominated by c-Si modules.
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2015
- Annual PV module production exceeds 60GW, high efficiency technologies like PERC gain market share, and bifacial, half-cut, shingled cells are introduced. Spire flashers are developed to test these technologies (5100SLP).
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2020
- PERC/PERT/Topcon cells are dominant and PV manufacturers move to larger wafers. Spire flashers are upgraded to test larger modules up to 2.6 m x 1.4 m.
Today
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Eternalsun Spire is a leading manufacturer of solar simulators for measuring the performance and reliability of PV modules.