Potential of Concentrated Photovoltaic System at Composite Climate of India

Concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) cells have always shown higher efficiencies (∼37%) compared to single junction high efficiency Maxeon cells(23%), HIT cells(22%) and the thin film CdTe (13%) cells/modules. However, outdoor field performance of these technologies does not reflect the similar performance, as shown under standard conditions. The techno-economic considerations for a specific site it is important to evaluate a technology as per field performance indicators such as annual yields (Yi) and Performance Ratio(PR). In this paper the performance of a multi junction solar cells based on III-V compound-materials (GaInP/GaInAs/Ge) concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) system with very high concentration ratio of 500X has been evaluated. The outdoor performance of CPV has been compared with the other high efficiency flat plate solar photovoltaic technologies under similar condition and same period of time. A radiation analysis on Direct Normal Incidence (DNI) has been also carried out throughout the year of 2011 for the test site to find out the suitability of CPV. It has been found that the CPV system showed lowest PR compared to the technologies.