Package Overview

pvdeg provides a python library of common degradation modes for fielded photovoltaics and accelerated testing. It currently offers functions to calculate test-chamber irradiance settings, the humidity of PV materials, the spectral degradation in backsheets, and more. Functionality has been simplified so you can use .psm3 weather files retrieved from NREL’s National Solar Radiation Database (NSRDB).

In some cases, such as calculating the relative backsheet spectral degradation, you will need spectraly resolved irradiance. This can be field data or data produced via simulation (for example: results from bifacial_radiance)

Package Functions:

  1. Stress Factors

  • Water Vapor Pressure, empirical model

  • Water Ingress Rate through PV module

  • Edge Seal Width for 25 year lifetime

  1. Degradation

  • Van ‘t Hoff degradation acceleration factor

  • Van ‘t Hoff environment characterization

  • Arrhenius degradation acceleration factor

  • Arrhenius environment characterization

  • Solder Fatigue

  • Spectral Degradation

  1. Standards

  • Ideal Installation Distance

For an in depth look at each class and function, please refer to API