Title :
Non-destructive determination of the degree of cross-linking of EVA solar module encapsulation Using DMA shear measurements
Author :
Mickiewicz, Rafal A. ; Cahill, Ed ; Wu, Po-I
Author_Institution :
Fraunhofer Center for Sustainable Energy Syst. (CSE), Cambridge, MA, USA
Abstract :
A mechanical measurement technique was investigated to correlate the degree of cross-linking in laminated ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA) solar module encapsulation with the cured EVA shear response by means of a dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) measurement. The technique was demonstrated on sample disks fabricated with commercially available EVA encapsulant and standard polyvinyl fluoride (Tedlar)/polyethylene terephthalate (PET)/EVA backsheet (TPE). This DMA test was found to be able to predict the gel content of low, medium, and high cross-linked samples to at least a 95% confidence level. Furthermore, this method is non-destructive and could potentially be applied to photovoltaic modules after lamination, enabling a rapid metrology technique for process and quality control in module manufacturing.
Keywords :
encapsulation; laminations; quality control; solar cells; DMA shear measurement; EVA backsheet; PET backsheet; Tedlar backsheet; cross-linking degree; cured EVA shear response; dynamic mechanical analysis; ethylene vinyl acetate; gel content; laminated EVA solar module encapsulation; lamination; mechanical measurement technique; module manufacturing; nondestructive determination; photovoltaic modules; polyethylene terephthalate backsheet; polyvinyl fluoride backsheet; quality control; rapid metrology technique; Abstracts; Mechanical variables measurement; Metrology; Photovoltaic systems; Polyethylene; Standards; EVA; cross-linking; encapsulation; gel content; non-destructive testing;
Conference_Titel :
Photovoltaic Specialists Conference (PVSC), 2012 38th IEEE
Conference_Location :
Austin, TX
Print_ISBN :
978-1-4673-0064-3
DOI :
10.1109/PVSC.2012.6317707
