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Encapsulant selection and durability testing experienceThe Flat Plate Solar Array Project (FSA) has established technically challenging cost and service life goals for photovoltaic modules. These goals are a cost of $70 sq m and an expected 30 years of service life in an outdoor weathering environment. out of the cost goal, $14 sq m is allocated for encapsulation materials, which includes the cost of a structural panel. At FSA's inception in 1975, the cumulative cost of encapsulation materials in popular use, such as room temperature vulcanized (RTV) silicones, aluminum panels, etc., greatly exceeded $14/sq m. Accordingly, it became necessary to identify and/or develop new materials and new material technologies to achieve the goals. Many of these new materials are low cost polymers that satisfy module engineering and encapsulation processing requirements but unfortunately are not intrinsically weather stable. This necessitates identifying lifetime and/or weathering deficiencies inherent in these low cost materials and developing specific approaches to enhancing weather stability.
Document ID
19860003306
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Conference Paper
Authors
Cuddihy, E. F. (Jet Propulsion Lab., California Inst. of Tech. Pasadena, CA, United States)
Date Acquired
August 12, 2013
Publication Date
October 1, 1985
Publication Information
Publication: Reliability and Eng. of Thin-Film Photovoltaic Modules
Subject Category
Energy Production And Conversion
Accession Number
86N12774
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Work of the US Gov. Public Use Permitted.

Related Records

IDRelationTitle19860003291Collected WorksReliability and Engineering of Thin-Film Photovoltaic Modules. Research forum proceedings
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