The online webinar was organized by IEA PVPS Task 13 in cooperation with the European Copper Institute and was held on 10 June 2021. It attracted more than 300 participants worldwide. The recording of this webinar is available here.
The IEA PVPS Task 13 has just released a new report entitled "Bifacial Photovoltaic Modules and Systems: Experience and Results from International Research and Pilot Applications". This report, with contributions from over forty contributing authors, provides an overview of bifacial PV technology, its benefits and challenges, as well as regional descriptions of R&D being done to better understand this technology. This webinar began with a short overview of the new report from its lead authors, Joshua S. Stein and Christian Reise and was followed by three technical presentations by report contributing authors:
- Bifacial Cells, Models and Systems – An Overview
Dr. Christian Reise, Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE, Freiburg, Germany - Physics and Performance Limits of Bifacial Photovoltaics: A Global Perspective
Prof. Muhammad Ashraf Alam, Purdue University - Large-scale Bifacial PV Testing in the Nordics for Model Validation
Dr. Nicholas Riedel-Lyngskær, PhD Candidate, Technical University of Denmark
Ulrike Jahn recaps the important conclusions from this webinar:
- The forecast for market share of bifacial cells and modules show a market share of 80% in 2030! (Source: ITRPV report 2016-2021)
- Bifacial-specific degradation issues have been discovered and are actively researched.
- Bifi cell and module innovations lead to new optimized bifacial system designs.
- Bifi gains in different regions depend on the orientation of the module and must be considered for the designs of PV farms.
- Tracking bifacial gain depends strongly on the latitude. Vertical bifacial farms may be good choice for higher latitudes.
- Bifacial Outdoor test facility at DUT provides high res monitoring outdoor data. They indicate changes of Albedo due to the changed grass coverage on the ground.
- Comparisons of model vs. measurement indicate that state-of-the-art bifacial performance models add about 0.5% uncertainty to the PV modelling chain.
To learn more about the results from this webinar, please contact our expert Ulrike Jahn.
