Carrisa Plains PV power plant performance

Abstract

This paper summarizes the performance of the world's largest PV power plant for [1984][1985][1986][1987][1988][1989]. Although the plant has high availability, energy production efficiency has declined at the rate of 8-12% per year since 1986. For the first time, performance results of mirrored and nonmirrored segments are presented. These results indicate that the non-mirrored segment is performing well with minimal efficiency degradation and low operation and maintenance costs.

Status, Trends, Challenges and the Bright Future of Solar Electricity from Photovoltaics

“…The world's largest centralized PV power plant to date was installed in central California between 1984 and 1985. The operation and performance over several years was reported [57], including operation and maintenance costs [58]. After several years of operation, the installation was disassembled and the modules were sold individually on the market.…”

A methodology to analyze photovoltaic tracker uptime

“…Solar trackers have been the focus of technical and economic debate from the early days of photovoltaics (PV). Single and dual‐axis tracked systems were built in the 1980s, but fixed‐tilt systems were used for most installations because of cost and reliability concerns . Long‐term irradiance data sets such as TMY2 clearly document the available energy gains for a tracked surface over a fixed‐tilt surface.…”

“…Long‐term irradiance data sets such as TMY2 clearly document the available energy gains for a tracked surface over a fixed‐tilt surface. Numerous publications simulate 10% to 25% energy generation gains for single‐axis systems over fixed‐tilt systems and 20% to 45% for dual‐axis over fixed‐tilt . Although the energy gains can be clear, documenting an economic gain is more difficult.…”

“…Single and dual-axis tracked systems were built in the 1980s, but fixed-tilt systems were used for most installations because of cost and reliability concerns. 1,2 Longterm irradiance data sets such as TMY2 3 clearly document the available energy gains for a tracked surface over a fixed-tilt surface. Numerous publications simulate 10% to 25% energy generation gains for singleaxis systems over fixed-tilt systems and 20% to 45% for dual-axis over fixed-tilt.…”

Tracking and ground cover ratio

“…1 The available literature describes several cases with good performance in terms of both reliability and energy gains. [2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15] Typical costs of PV grid-connected systems at current Spanish market are around 5s/Wp for static arrays (3s/Wp for PV modules plus wiring, 0Á5s/Wp for support structure plus civil works, 0Á5s/Wp for inverters and 1s/Wp for others) and 6s/Wp for two-axes tracking (support structure plus civil works are now 1, 5s/Wp).…”