VENDORVIEW
Reliable and rapid testing and
installation of thin-film modules
Zuse’s successors make production processes more efficient
T
echnological progress has always been the work of many masterminds. Today, numerous developers together with Alessandro Volta, Alexandre Bequerel, Georg Simon Ohm, Charles Babbage, Henry Ford or also the computer pioneer Konrad Zuse share their reputation of having contributed to the development, to going into production and cost degression of photovoltaic modules. And rightly so: The technological advancement of the photovoltaic is a worldwide project which benefits from synergies of the most varied branches and fields of research, given the fact that worldwide countless hopes lie in this technology, whether as energy supplier, guarantor of jobs, development object or investment of money.
Now that the photovoltaic has finally outgrown the university laboratories and emerged into gigawatt factories, there is a growing importance of mechanical and plant engineering in designing high-tech equipment. Grid parity is the top priority, for government aid alone is not sufficient as promoter for customer decisions, the price must be competitive. Production processes must become quicker, more efficient and more reliable. The wealth of experience from other highly automated industries like from the automotive industry and its component suppliers is very much appreciated by the branch. Strama-MPS is one of these innovative technology drivers who earned their merits in designing of high performance special machinery.
Solar simulator with LEDs
“In the automotive industry we shift the technological limits in the parts per thousand range, in the photovoltaic manufacturing processes the optimization potentials partially are in the double- digit percentage range”, explains Andreas Tomschi, Product Manager Solar Technology at Strama-MPS, the difference. Here and there, integrated processes are the basis of the technology concept. So, worldwide for the first time ever, in cooperation with a leading manufacturer of thin-film modules a sunlight simulator with LED illumination area was developed, which besides measurement and documentation of the I/V-characteristic provides the possibility of inline annealing of localized micro short circuits (shunt busting).
“ProMoSim” was not designed for the final quality inspection, but clearly has its strengths for the in-process intermediate inspection”, says Josef Sagstetter, Project Manager of the Photovoltaic Division at the Bavarian special machine maker. ”The continuous light function allows preconditioning of highly
Sun simulator illumination area and contacting
efficient PV modules prior to the measurement of the I/V- characteristic (light soaking) and by the shunt-busting function their efficiency may even be increased. The test rig meets Class A according to IEC 60904-9, is designed for an annual capacity of 50 – optionally up to 100 MWp and thus ensures the high throughput required for a modern PV module production.“ Intensity and homogeneity of the illumination area are checked at regular intervals and a program-controlled adjustment of every single LED array is made, taking only a few minutes for the whole calibration process. In contrast to the conventional flash solar simulators the long service life of the illuminants is a very considerable advantage. Between the single maintenance intervals the output is in the range of approx. 10 million PV modules.
47
www.solar-pv-management.com Issue II 2010
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104