Photovoltaic Module Reliability

10What does the Future Hold for PV and a Brief Summary

The discussions in the previous chapters looked at both the history and present‐day status of photovoltaics (PV) module reliability and the accelerated stress testing associated with it. In this final chapter, the focus will shift to the future. PV is a dynamic industry so the technology and the testing standards are constantly evolving. The first section in this chapter will provide an update on the changes already in progress for some of the more important module qualification and safety standards. The second section will switch to a longer‐range view, discussing how PV module reliability is likely to change in the future and what sort of accelerated stress testing will be necessary to validate the quality of the huge volume of modules produced. The book will end with a brief summary of the status of PV module reliability today.

10.1 Current Work on Updating Standards

Since PV is such a dynamic industry there is always work ongoing to update the standards. At this time, there are three important module testing standards in various stages of preparation. Two of these are updates of our old friends, the IEC 61215 series on Module Qualification and the IEC 61730 series on Module Safety. The third document is IEC TS 63126 [1] on qualifying modules to operate at higher temperatures. This is a new technical specification under development in WG2. Each of these will make significant changes to the way modules are tested.