Analysis of the soiling effect under different conditions on different photovoltaic glasses and cells using an indoor soiling chamber

• Published in: Renewable energy 2021-01, Vol.163, p.1560-1568
• Main Authors: Muñoz-García, Miguel-Ángel, Fouris, Tom, Pilat, Eric
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Anti-reflective glass; Anti-soiling glass; Soiling; Soiling chamber
• ISSN: 0960-1481; 1879-0682
• DOI: 10.1016/j.renene.2020.10.027

The effects of deposition of dust (soiling) on photovoltaic (PV) modules, mainly on their energy production, is a topic that is gaining importance, related to the increase in PV installations in very sunny arid areas and, therefore, which theoretically lead to higher energy production. Due to the multitude of influent factors regarding soiling experiments, the use of a climatic chamber dedicated to the study of soiling is a subject of great interest. This work presents a methodology to reproduce the soiling process and the analysis of its effects, using optical and electrical approaches. The experiments included simulating different climatic conditions representative of the desert climate. In total, 19 replicates were performed for three different experiment conditions on five different glasses and two solar cells. Different glass samples, with different anti-soiling treatments, have been used to measure optical transmittance losses and to examine deposition by microscopy, while photovoltaic cells have been used to quantify electrical losses. The dust load ranged from 1.30 to 1.63 g/m2 promoting electrical losses from 4.73 to 6.90% depending not only on the dust load but also on the conditions in which it was deposited. •1 Soiling process can be reproduced inside a chamber for various ambient conditions.•2 Dust load is the main parameter but not the only one affecting soiling effects.•3 When the dew point is reached, water channels appear reducing the impact of soiling.•4 Spectral-response weighed optical transmission is used for photocurrent prediction.•5 Big differences between solar cell and air temperatures decreases soiling.