Comparison of Xenon Lamp-Based And
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COMPARISON OF XENON LAMP-BASED AND LED-BASED SOLAR SIMULATORS by Gregory Patrick Leary A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Electrical Engineering MONTANA STATE UNIVERSITY Bozeman, Montana April, 2016 ©COPYRIGHT by Gregory Patrick Leary 2016 All Rights Reserved ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to acknowledge the commitment and support of my family in allowing me to experience this education and wonderful place. My wife, Cindy Leary, son Quinn Leary, and daughter Mae Leary have made this journey a present pleasure. Also, my Parents, Dean and Gail Leary, my sister, Amy Leary, and my sister Angie Hornby and her family Jake Hornby, Logan Hornby and Baylor Hornby have encouraged, shared, and joined in this journey, helping us in anyway they could. I am thankful to and for each of you. I want to also gives a special thank you to my mentor Dr. Todd Kaiser for providing me with the numerous opportunities in this program; to Gene Kuntz and Dr. Gregg Switzer at ILX-lightwave who made this project possible; to my graduate committee Dr. Joe Shaw and Dr. Hashem Nehrir who were instrumental in my education in the department, to the electrical engineering graduate students for their generously in sharing time, conversations, resources, and ideas; to Dr. Phil Himmer and the Montana Microfabrication Facility for their support in the cleanrooms; and finally to the electrical engineering department for the opportunity to be a graduate student. Find fun and live a great story. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. INTRODUCTION ...........................................................................................................1 2. BACKGROUND .............................................................................................................3 The Utility of Solar Energy ..............................................................................................3 Solar Energy Technology ................................................................................................5 Photovoltaic Solar Cells ...........................................................................................5 Solar Thermal Technology ......................................................................................8 Thermoelectric Technology .....................................................................................9 Solar Fuels .............................................................................................................10 Solar Simulators .............................................................................................................10 Spectral Match .......................................................................................................11 Spatial Uniformity .................................................................................................13 Temporal Stability .................................................................................................13 Xenon Lamp Source ..............................................................................................14 LED Light Source ..................................................................................................15 3. METHODS ....................................................................................................................17 I-V Curves for Photovoltaic Testing ..............................................................................17 I-V Curve Measurement Setup ......................................................................................19 Spectral Response and Quantum Efficiency ..................................................................20 Spectral Response Measurement Setup .........................................................................22 Spectral Mismatch Correction Factor ............................................................................23 4. TEST RESULTS ............................................................................................................25 Solar Simulator Spectra .................................................................................................25 Matched Solar Simulator I-V curves .............................................................................28 Calculated Spectral Mismatch Factors ...........................................................................29 Experimentally Measured Spectral Mismatch ...............................................................30 Solar Simulator Temperature Effects .............................................................................31 5. CONCLUSIONS ...........................................................................................................33 REFERENCES CITED ......................................................................................................36 APPENDIX A: IQE200 System Operations Manual .........................................................40 iv LIST OF TABLES Table Page 1. Matched solar cell comparisons .........................................................................28 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page 1. Earth’s Energy Resources ....................................................................................4 2. Record Solar Cell Efficiency ...............................................................................8 3. Solar Spectrum ...................................................................................................12 4. Xenon Lamp Spectrum. ...................................................................................14 5. LED Solar Spectrum ..........................................................................................15 6. PV Current-Voltage Testing ..............................................................................19 7. Spectral Response ..............................................................................................21 8. Solar Simulator Spectra .....................................................................................26 9. Matched I-V Curves ...........................................................................................27 10. Experimentally Determined Spectral Mismatch ..............................................31 11. Solar Simulator Temperature Effects ...............................................................32 vi ABSTRACT Rapid advances in high intensity light emitting diodes (LEDs) have provided sufficient tools to design LED solar simulators to accurately mimic the sun. LEDs offer numerous advantages over lamp-based technology currently used. However, these advantages have not been harnessed because of limitations in creating a solar simulator with the highest rating (AAA) for spectral match, temporal stability, and light uniformity. Oriel’s VeraSol is one of the first LED, triple A solar simulators. The VeraSol-LED is compared to the equally rated Oriel Sol3A-xenon lamp solar simulator by studying the current-voltage (I-V) and spectral response of a variety of solar cells. Both simulators effectively mimic the sun; however, the results demonstrated the LED- based simulator produced a more stable, flexible, and accurate match to AM1.5G than the xenon lamp Sol3A with similar marks in the quality of PV cell response. 1 INTRODUCTION A wide variety of light sources, including the natural sun, have been utilized to characterize photovoltaic (PV) systems. A solar simulator is a light source engineered to mimic the sun and used for testing PV cells within a controlled, reproducible environment. Currently, the quality of a solar simulator is graded on the spatial uniformity across a defined illumination area, the temporal stability through the experiment, and the spectral match to the sun from a clearly defined reference spectrum (AM1.5: http://rredc.nrel.gov/solar/spectra/am1.5/). These standards are collected in a series of guidelines put forth by three internationally recognized standards bodies: 1) the IEC (Photovoltaic Devices- Part 9: Solar Simulator Performance Requirements 60904-9), 2) the JIS (Solar Simulators for crystalline solar cells and modules, C 8912), and 3) the ASTM (Standard Specification for Solar Simulation for Terrestrial PV Testing, E927) [1]. A general consensus considers a performance grading (A, B, and C) for spatial uniformity, temporal stability, and spectral match. Commercially, the xenon arc lamp has dominated the solar simulator light technology of the past 15-20 years. The xenon bulb is very close to an ideal point source of light with a relatively continuous and uniform spectrum across the solar spectrum. However, like many lamp-based simulators, the spectral intensity of the lamp decreases and the irradiance spectrum shifts from blue to red as the lamp ages; the primary change taking place within the first 200 hours of use [2,3]. Recent advancements in LED technology have allowed for a full sun spectral coverage from 400-1100 nm. An LED is a solid-state light source that emits light via 2 electroluminescence over a narrow range of the electromagnetic spectrum (30-50 nm). The parallel combination of unique LEDs can be used to match the AM1.5G spectrum in addition to allowing output control of the light source with a 30-50 nm resolution [3, 4, 5, and 6]. LEDs seem to be a viable advancement in solar simulator technology because of the added spectral control but also because the LEDs have a longer lifetime, reduced heat, a stable output, fast gating (millisecond), and lower power consumption. The Oriel VeraSol-LED