System Integration

Effective management of cabling in a PV system can greatly impact its lifetime maintenance requirements and thus profitability. Samuel Truthseeker of TECSI Solar looks in detail at the latest developments in wire management and highlights several reliability considerations.

Amid reports of logistical and bureaucratic difficulties, Germany’s IB Vogt earlier this year became the first company to complete and energise one of the multiple projects that will eventually make up Benban, Egypt’s gargantuan solar park in the western desert governorate of Aswan.

PV systems incorporating bifacial modules require careful design and integration to maximise the additional yield they offer. Drawing on extensive field studies, researchers from LONGi Solar describe the optimum design of bifacial systems in the desert conditions of the Middle East, to which bifacial technology is especially well suited

Bifacial technology is seen by many as the shape of things to come for the solar industry. But how is it regarded by those on the frontline of choosing equipment that will result in the most profitable projects? Jenya Meydbray, VP of solar technology at Cypress Creek Renewables, offers an insider’s view

As described in the previous pages, tracking and bifacial technologies combined offer the prospect of higher energy outputs. Javier Guerrero, R&D manager at Soltec, one of the pioneers of bifacial tracking, explains some of the lessons the company has learned about optimising tracker design for bifacial modules

Bifacial technology promises significant reductions in the levelised cost of electricity for PV systems, and almost all major PV suppliers are already producing or planning bifacial modules. Hartmut Nussbaumer, Markus Klenk, Andreas Halm & Andreas Schneider give an overview of the currently available bifacial modules and cell technologies and adapted mounting solutions

In April of this year, the Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, drew scorn when he announced that every village across India had access to electricity. The reality that ‘electrification’ in government terminology meant that a mere 10% of households in any one village had power, was not made clear in the initial announcements.

The worldwide market for trackers is developing rapidly and so too are the technologies they use. Mark Osborne reports on some of the latest design innovatoins that are helping drive trackers into new markets and applications.

Delhi-headquartered renewable energy firm Hero Future Energies has completed India’s first largescale solar and wind energy hybrid project in the state of Karnataka. The project at Kavithal, Raichur District, which included an existing 50MW wind farm, now has a neighbouring 28.8MW solar PV site to form a hybrid system.

Leading PV inverter manufacturer Huawei discusses recent technical developments to a better understanding of bifacial solar module PV power plants, using three recent case studies. These efficient PV modules need to be used with devices such as inverters to maximize value. Recently, many inverters and solutions that match bifacial modules have appeared in the industry. Which solution is the best match for bifacial modules? Based on a large amount of experimental data, this article describes the solution needed for bifacial modules.