Field Testing Meets Modeling: Validated Data on Bifacial Solar Performance
Though bifacial solar cell technology is not new to PV, recent advances have made the technology more commercially viable than ever before for PV power plants.
Along with that viability, however, come questions about the potential energy yield and best practices when choosing bifacial modules over their monofacial counterparts.
In particular, university research and other preliminary studies of the increase in gain from a switch to bifacial modules suggested a bump of 20-30% was possible – but is that really the case?
In short, no.
Array Technologies partnered with PV Lighthouse and CFV Solar Test Laboratory to conduct an independent study assessing the real-world impact of bifacial solar cells.
The study’s goal was to determine best practices for modeling the technology in order to get an accurate view of a utility scale PV plant’s power production. By using field data from CFV correlated by three-dimensional ray tracing modeling from PV Lighthouse, the study determined realistic modeling inputs. The results present bankable, real-world modeling best practices for bifacial power plants.
The recent Greentech Media webinar based on this research gave Array, PV Lighthouse and CFV the chance to answer common questions about the study and its findings.
Webinar Q&A Highlights
If you missed the webinar, below is a look at some of the highlights as well as answers to questions which were submitted by attendees.
Answers below were provided by Array’s Kyumin Lee (KL), PV Lighthouse’s Keith McIntosh (KM) and CFV’s Jim Crimmins (JC).
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