Comparative analysis of the reliability of grid-connected photovoltaic power systems

Author

Yang Wang ; Peng Zhang ; Wenyuan Li ; Kan´an, N.H.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Univ. of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, USA

fYear

2012

fDate

22-26 July 2012

Firstpage

1

Lastpage

8

Abstract

This study compares the reliability performance of string inverter structure and central inverter structure for grid-tied solar photovoltaic (PV) systems. The impact of input power variation and ambient-conditions on failure rates of PV system components are quantified and incorporated in the reliability analysis. Aging failure in PV panels is also modeled to evaluate the life cycle reliability of both types of PV systems. Sensitivity analyses are extensively conducted to explore the impact of different factors on the performances of different PV systems. Test results on a practical 20 kW PV project are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the presented method.

Keywords

invertors; photovoltaic power systems; power generation faults; power generation reliability; power grids; aging failure; central inverter structure; grid connected photovoltaic power systems; input power variation; life cycle reliability; power 20 kW; power generation reliability; reliability analysis; string inverter structure; Aging; Arrays; Availability; Inverters; Maintenance engineering; Power system reliability; Photovoltaic system; central inverter; reliability; sensitivity; state enumeration; string inverter;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Power and Energy Society General Meeting, 2012 IEEE

Conference_Location

San Diego, CA

ISSN

1944-9925

Print_ISBN

978-1-4673-2727-5

Electronic_ISBN

1944-9925

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/PESGM.2012.6345373

Filename

6345373