Built Solar Assets Are ‘chronically Underperforming’ And Modules Degrading Faster Than Expected, Res

The risk management company kWh Analytics found that the underperformance of solar assets continues to deteriorate, with the project’s “long-term underperformance” P99 estimates and component degradation faster than previously expected.

The new solar risk assessment released by kWh Analytics this week brings together many industry experts to assess the greatest risks faced by the global solar industry and identify some serious threats that may reduce investor returns and harm the industry’s ability to move forward. Reliability.

The report itself is divided into three parts, detailing the risks of financial modeling, operational performance and extreme weather to solar assets. Each section has insights from a range of contributors, including PV Evolution Labs, BloombergNEF, Fracsun, and Nextracker.

The most notable finding in this report may be based on the findings of last year's version, that solar assets in operation continue to experience a higher than expected degradation rate, and the annual degradation rate in this field is observed to be about 1%.

It cites recent research conducted by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and kWh Analytics to prove the assumption made in 2016 that solar modules will degrade by about 0.5% each year, which is outdated and underestimated each year. Degradation is as high as 0.5%.

The latest data from kWh Analytics shows that the median annual degradation of residential solar systems is 1.09%, and that of non-residential systems is 0.8%. The report pointed out that in the 20-year asset life, project degradation may therefore be underestimated by as much as 14%, leading to an overestimation of the performance and revenue forecasts generated in the P50 model.

The company stated that the “system misalignment between actual degradation and estimated degradation” is having a negative impact on the industry, and the P50 modeling assumptions should be reassessed and recalibrated immediately.

PV Evolution Labs reported its annual module reliability scorecard at the end of last month and found that the failure rate of solar modules continued to rise. It is also a contributor to the report, pointing out that small differences in raw materials may have an impact on overall system performance by as much as 5%.

Tristan Erion-Lorico, head of PVEL's photovoltaic module business, wrote in the report that the increase in the number of suppliers of sealants and backsheets has also increased the need for due diligence and broader specifications on the bill of materials (BOM) to ensure quality.

Erion-Lorico cited a specific analysis example performed by PVEL, which found that a manufacturer used different BOMs in the same product code and found that the potential induced degradation (PID) difference between two BOM combinations was close to 5%.

Erion-Lorico and PV Tech talked about the importance of ensuring that products maintain high quality as the industry expands last week.

Other key findings in the risk section of financial modeling include the estimate that one-eighth of solar assets’ “long-term” performance is lower than P99, and the discovery from DNV, which estimates that about 2% of the energy production loss of the single-axis tracker system is caused by Terrain and other factors.

At the same time, the extreme weather risk part of the report includes a study by Clean Power Research, which showed that wildfires reduced energy production in western US states by 6% last year, and Nextracker’s research showed that storing modules at a 60-degree angle can increase the number of modules The survival rate during hail reached 99.4%.

Nextracker contributed to the performance of solar assets during extreme weather events in the last edition of PV Tech Power released last month, which can be downloaded here.

The full report published by kWh Analytics can be accessed here.

In the report's executive summary, kWh Analytics noted that the compiled data emphasized that the industry has "important work to do" in mitigating financial, operational and natural disaster risks.

"Leaving these risks out of control will damage investment returns and ultimately damage the collective reputation of the industry. For financiers, sponsors, insurance companies, consultants, lawyers and engineers, it is more important than ever to reflect on us. The current development trajectory and build new solutions to manage these emergency risks,” the report pointed out.