Analysis and simulation of cracks and micro cracks in PV cells

Author

Al Ahmar, Joseph ; Wiese, Stefan

Author_Institution

Univ. of Saarland, Saarbrucken, Germany

fYear

2013

fDate

14-17 April 2013

Firstpage

1

Lastpage

4

Abstract

The goal in this analysis is to undestand more about the progressing of preexisting cracks in silicon solar cells under different enviromental loads. This enables to estimate critical crack sizes and reduce the losses and to improve realibility. In this work we present a 2D finite element model of encapsulated silicon solar cells containing cracks on critical positions. Cracks were modelled using special elements in ANSYS and the enviromental load caused by the thermal cycle is applied. In order to execute the evaluation of crack propagation on critical areas in the cross section of the solar cell the fracture mechanic theory is used and corresponding parameters are calculated.

Keywords

elemental semiconductors; finite element analysis; fracture mechanics; microcracks; reliability; silicon; solar cells; 2D finite element model; ANSYS; crack propagation; crack simulation; critical crack size estimation; encapsulated silicon solar cells; environmental load; fracture mechanic theory; loss reduction; microcrack analysis; reliability improvement; thermal cycle; Abstracts; Analytical models; Computational modeling; Copper; Load modeling; Materials; Stress;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Thermal, Mechanical and Multi-Physics Simulation and Experiments in Microelectronics and Microsystems (EuroSimE), 2013 14th International Conference on

Conference_Location

Wroclaw

Print_ISBN

978-1-4673-6138-5

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/EuroSimE.2013.6529952

Filename

6529952