Ekin, Muhammed Emin (2018-03). Thermal Modeling of Photovoltaic Modules for Reliability Assessment of Single-Phase Module-Integrated Power Electronics in Turkey. Master's Thesis.
Thesis
Renewable energy sources, especially those providing solar energy, are currently some of the fastest growing energy sources in the world. Both academia and the corporate world have invested in this technology to decrease the cost and increase the performance, efficiency, and reliability of photovoltaic (PV) modules. Though research is ongoing, there are certain meteorological parameters that affect the overall module temperature which may adversely impact the performance, efficiency, and reliability of the renewable energy system. Increases in temperature are responsible for many of the failures and degradations reported in PV modules. For many PV materials, like silicon-based PV cells which account for 90% of the current market, increasing the module temperature decreases the conversion efficiency, which decreases the amount of electrical energy produced. Thus, module temperature plays a crucial role in the overall photovoltaic energy conversion process. The datasheets for photovoltaic modules consider only a small range of operating conditions that are the standard test condition (STC) and the normal operating cell temperature (NOCT), despite the modules being required to function in an extensive range of conditions and variety of situations. Thus, accurately understanding PV module temperature via thermal modeling is essential to calculating module performance, efficiency, and reliability. In thermal modeling, environmental conditions affect electrical stresses and component thermal behavior, so reliable calculations are necessary to understand the operating points. In this regard, the broader impact of this research is to model a methodology and tool by which users, researchers, and manufacturers can evaluate candidate PV technologies for power conversion, energy harvesting, and reliability determination. In the current research, this method has been applied to certain regions of Turkey. This avoided requiring expensive and time-consuming testbeds and long-term data logging. However, this improved methodology could be applied to other regions around the world.
