Studying the impact of stress/strain on cracks in laminated crystalline silicon cells: Opening the doors of synchrotron facilities to the PV module industry

In this paper we present and discuss the capabilities of synchrotron X-ray topography for the direct imaging and analysis of defects, stress and strain affecting the cell within the laminated photovoltaic module. The results of the initial synchrotron experiment done at Brookhaven National Laboratory-NSLS II and the following topography campaign run at the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Laboratory will be presented and discussed. Cracks originating from grain boundaries and strain affecting the cell in the module package are clearly revealed on the X-ray topographs of a commercial single-cell mini-module - also known as reference cell. With this experiment we demonstrate that the use of synchrotron facilities is promising for the non-destructive analysis of the entire PV module structure.