Independent check lab Kiwa PVEL named 53 producers and 388 fashions–a report variety of Top Performers within the Scorecard’s ten-year historical past.
PV Evolution Labs (PVEL), an unbiased check lab for the downstream photo voltaic business and member of the Kiwa Group, has revealed its 2024 PV Module Reliability Scorecard. This 10th version of the Scorecard named 388 fashions of PV modules from 53 producers as Top Performers in PVEL testing, essentially the most within the firm’s historical past. Last 12 months Scorecard named 250 mannequin sorts amongst 35 producers.
Kiwa PVEL makes use of the Product Qualification Program (PQP) to supply the photo voltaic business with empirical information for PV module benchmarking and project-level vitality yield and monetary modules to establish top-performing PV modules.
The PQP was expanded within the fall of 2023 with a brand new check to deal with considerations about ultraviolet-induced deterioration (UVID). It additionally centered the hail stress sequence (HSS) to establish the glass breakage threshold and modified the mechanical stress sequence (MSS) to focus on module mechanical sturdiness considerations.
In addition to expanded PQP testing, different updates to the Scorecard embrace a brand new Top Performer class for hail, highlighting modules that haven’t skilled glass breakage with ≥40 mm of hail , and a better bar for LID+LETID and PAN Top Performers, with a raised threshold for Top Performer qualification as applied sciences enhance,
This 12 months’s Scorecard highlights the Top Performers producers in a number of classes, offering precious insights into the impacts of assorted cell applied sciences and module designs, and providing a deep dive- for the primary time-in Kiwa PVEL’s Incidence Angle Modifier (IAM) check outcomes.
“Our 2024 Scorecard reveals sturdy outcomes throughout a various group of photo voltaic module producers, reflecting the significance and progress we have noticed in PV manufacturing lately,” stated Kevin Gibson, managing director of Kiwa PVEL. “For greater than a decade, we have been testing hypotheses about photo voltaic module reliability and efficiency whereas persevering with to refine our strategy because the business continues to innovate with new applied sciences and module designs. We’re proud that we nonetheless set a excessive bar for producers and supply consumers under with the essential info they should make educated buying choices.
This partial listing reveals during which exams every producer has achieved Top Performer standing with a number of fashions. Kiwa PVEL famous that in some circumstances, check outcomes for some check classes weren’t out there on the time of publishing the Scorecard. Manufacturers are listed by variety of exams, adopted by the variety of years they’ve been designated a Top Performer, in alphabetical order. Click right here to seek out mannequin numbers. The full listing of Top Performers is a searchable database, the place outcomes could be filtered by PQP check, producer identify, module sort, cell expertise, and extra.
“With over 50,000 distinctive guests to the 2023 version, our Scorecard is the business’s go-to useful resource for dependable module insights. While we admire the manufacturing advances and the variety of Top Performers listed, we remind consumers to stay vigilant,” stated Tristan Erion-Lorico, vice chairman of gross sales and advertising at Kiwa PVEL. “We encourage them to look at every web page of the Scorecard to higher perceive the han -are the check outcomes we see each day in Kiwa PVEL’s labs.”
Notable on this 12 months’s check outcomes is that 66% of module producers skilled at the very least one check failure, which Kiwa PVEL says is the best proportion reported.
With excessive climate occasions damaging some photo voltaic installations in current months, the brand new Top Performer class for hail shines a highlight on how hail exams . Kiwa PVEL focuses totally on 2.0 mm glass // glass and three.2 mm glass // backsheet, however the outcomes present that three examined BOMs of two.5 mm glass // glass present no glass breaking with 50 mm of ice. Kiwa PVEL notes that whereas glass breakage shouldn’t be often thought of a Scorecard “failure,” some producers require a number of retests of the identical ice diameter earlier than attaining the specified check efficiency. of ice, and three producers have modules the place the junction field cowl falls off attributable to hail. results.
To qualify for the 2024 Scorecard, producers should have accomplished the PQP pattern manufacturing manufacturing facility witness after October 1, 2022, and submitted at the very least two PV module samples which have been factory-witnessed in all PQP reliability exams, based on Kiwa PVEL BOM check necessities.
Kiwa PVEL, a testing lab for downstream photo voltaic challenge builders, financiers, and asset house owners world wide, is a part of the Kiwa Group.
Access the Scorecard right here. Read about final 12 months’s Scorecard right here.
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