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Description
As the photovoltaic (PV) power plants age in the field, the PV modules degrade and generate visible and invisible defects. A defect and statistical degradation rate analysis of photovoltaic (PV) power plants is presented in two-part thesis. The first part of the thesis deals with the defect analysis and the second part of the thesis deals with the statistical degradation rate analysis. In the first part, a detailed analysis on the performance or financial risk related to each defect found in multiple PV power plants across various climatic regions of the USA is presented by assigning a risk priority number (RPN). The RPN for all the defects in each PV plant is determined based on two databases: degradation rate database; defect rate database. In this analysis it is determined that the RPN for each plant is dictated by the technology type (crystalline silicon or thin-film), climate and age. The PV modules aging between 3 and 19 years in four different climates of hot-dry, hot-humid, cold-dry and temperate are investigated in this study.
In the second part, a statistical degradation analysis is performed to determine if the degradation rates are linear or not in the power plants exposed in a hot-dry climate for the crystalline silicon technologies. This linearity degradation analysis is performed using the data obtained through two methods: current-voltage method; metered kWh method. For the current-voltage method, the annual power degradation data of hundreds of individual modules in six crystalline silicon power plants of different ages is used. For the metered kWh method, a residual plot analysis using Winters’ statistical method is performed for two crystalline silicon plants of different ages. The metered kWh data typically consists of the signal and noise components. Smoothers remove the noise component from the data by taking the average of the current and the previous observations. Once this is done, a residual plot analysis of the error component is performed to determine the noise was successfully separated from the data by proving the noise is random.
In the second part, a statistical degradation analysis is performed to determine if the degradation rates are linear or not in the power plants exposed in a hot-dry climate for the crystalline silicon technologies. This linearity degradation analysis is performed using the data obtained through two methods: current-voltage method; metered kWh method. For the current-voltage method, the annual power degradation data of hundreds of individual modules in six crystalline silicon power plants of different ages is used. For the metered kWh method, a residual plot analysis using Winters’ statistical method is performed for two crystalline silicon plants of different ages. The metered kWh data typically consists of the signal and noise components. Smoothers remove the noise component from the data by taking the average of the current and the previous observations. Once this is done, a residual plot analysis of the error component is performed to determine the noise was successfully separated from the data by proving the noise is random.
ContributorsSundarajan, Prasanna (Author) / Tamizhmani, Govindasamy (Thesis advisor) / Rogers, Bradley (Committee member) / Srinivasan, Devarajan (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2016
Description
The existing compact models can reproduce the characteristics of MOSFETs in the temperature range of -40oC to 125oC. Some applications require circuits to operate over a wide temperature range consisting of temperatures below the specified range of existing compact models, requiring wide temperature range compact models for the design of such circuits. In order to develop wide temperature range compact models, fourteen different geometries of n-channel and p-channel MOSFETs manufactured in a 0.18μm mixed-signal process were electrically characterized over a temperature range of 40 K to 298 K. Electrical characterization included ID-VG and ID-VD under different drain, body and gate biases respectively. The effects of low-temperature operation on the performance of 0.18μm MOSFETs have been studied and discussed in terms of sub-threshold characteristics, threshold voltage, the effect of the body bias and linearity of the device. As it is well understood, the subthreshold slope, the threshold voltage, drive currents of the MOSFETs increase when the temperature of the MOSFETs is lowered, which makes it advantageous to operate the MOSFETs at low-temperatures. However the internal linearity gm1/gm3 of the MOSFETs degrades as the temperature of the MOSFETs is lowered, and the performance of the MOSFETs can be affected by the interface traps that exist in higher density close to conduction band and valence band energy levels, as the Fermi-level moves closer to bandgap edges when MOSFETs are operated at cryogenic temperatures.
ContributorsKathuria, Achal (Author) / Barnaby, Hugh (Thesis advisor) / Schroder, Dieter K. (Committee member) / Vermeire, Bert (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2010