Average Loss Of Power Effeciency Due To Dirty Solar Panels

Pv glass and cells.

Average loss of power effeciency due to dirty solar panels.

Understand that solar panel manufacturers try to avoid the subject as they do not want to make potential buyers aware of the problem. Or in other words 40 watts are lost with time. Dust effect on solar panel increase as the tilt angle of incident increases. Tests by the german fraunhofer institute showed that solar panels which are susceptible can lose more than 30 of their rated power through this effect and as much as 90 in extreme cases.

Solar panels have been consistently increasing in efficiency at about 5 annually since 2010. For example a solar panel of 200 watts will produce 80 of 200 160 watts in the 25th year from now due to degradation reversible and irreversible degradation with time. I recently had a friend spend 20k for panels. Dirt accumulation soiling is accounted for by our design team when calculating solar production.

So on an average we are losing 40 watts 25 years 1 6 watts per year or 0 8 per year. Do the math a 4 to 5 loss per year in 5 years you ve lost 20 25. Since the use life of a solar system is 20 to 25 years think how the car windows on your car would look if you only hose it off every six months. Power loss rise from 23 in normal incident to 4 7 24 8 at 58 for radiometer bird dropping one of the issues in this study.

In my opinion this is an insignificant loss when considering how dirty the solar panels were. They found that solar panels in very dirty environments saw a 25 percent drop in efficiency from atmospheric pollution alone. Dirty solar panels will see an average 3 5 production boost when cleaned. The average efficiency of solar panels falls between the 17 to 19 percent efficiency range.

The highest efficiency solar panels on the market today can reach almost 23 percent efficiency. Potential induced degradation pid is a relatively recently discovered phenomenon which can occur in solar panels although a concise understanding of what causes it is still being finalised. Interesting that the solar companies tell you that the degradation percentages are 1 per year but in recent studies their findings are closer to 4 and 5. 16 m to 5 y.

Dirty solar array has 1 4 reduction each year.