A Comprehensive Study of Module Layouts for Silicon Solar Cells Under Partial Shading

Integrated applications for solar energy production becomes increasingly important. The electrification of car bodies and building facades are only two prominent examples. In such applications shading becomes a challenging problem, since the classic serial interconnection of solar cells in terms of...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:IEEE journal of photovoltaics 2022-03, Vol.12 (2), p.546-556
Main Authors: Klasen, Nils, Lux, Florian, Weber, Julian, Roessler, Torsten, Kraft, Achim
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Automotive bodies
Circuits
Electrification
Hypercubes
Latin hypercube sampling
Layout
Layouts
LTspice simulations
Modules
partial shading
Photovoltaic cells
Photovoltaic systems
Predictive models
Radiation effects
Shading
shading resilience
shingle matrix
shingling
Solar cells
Solar energy
Strings
Urban areas
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Summary:Integrated applications for solar energy production becomes increasingly important. The electrification of car bodies and building facades are only two prominent examples. In such applications shading becomes a challenging problem, since the classic serial interconnection of solar cells in terms of power output is highly vulnerable to partial shading. In this article, we investigate the three most common module layouts in the market (conventional, butterfly, and shingle string) and add a fourth layout (shingle matrix) to be introduced to the market in the future. We discuss an approach to cluster shadings occurring in urban surroundings into basic shapes like "rectangular" and "random". Choosing a Monte Carlo technique in combination with latin hypercube sampling (LHS), we consider more than 3000 scenarios in total. For the evaluation of the scenarios, we conduct circuit simulations using LTspice. Furthermore, we define a normalization base, which considers only partial shading as a quantitative baseline for comparison. Our results show, that already for 200-400 scenarios the obtained output values stabilize. Among the investigated module layouts, the shingle matrix interconnection achieves the highest score, followed by a shingle string, half-cell butterfly and the conventional full-cell layout.
ISSN:2156-3381
2156-3403
DOI:10.1109/JPHOTOV.2022.3144635