Performance of Solar PV Systems

Abstract

This chapter provides a review of the complete solar photovoltaic system that includes a discussion on the trends in manufacturing technology of the constituting components. The chapter then provides the reader with a detailed discussion on the steps that a designer will need to assess the performance of the PV system. The chapter finally presents four case studies of real installations and indicates lessons learned from them. Throughout those case studies material is provided on detailed measurements related to the incident solar radiation, PV cell temperature, thermal losses that occur from PV modules and their measured efficiency. Thus, it is possible to evaluate the accuracy of the modelling procedures using the latter measured data set.