Output Enhancement of Bifacial Solar Modules Under Diffuse and Specular Albedo

We present an albedo-centric reverse-ray tracing software to model the influence of albedo surfaces with complex spectro-angular reflectance (i.e. diffuse, glossy, specular, and metamaterials) on the short-circuit current density of a bifacial module. We find that for a silicon heterojunction module, a diffuse albedo leads to higher output and is more robust to self-shading and changes in orientation than a specular reflector. Our approach enables detailed and accurate albedo-dependent output calculation for various known and even exotic reflectors. Such a methodology can be used to design optimal reflectors and determine optimal configurations.