The increase in the performance of photovoltaic modules requires the improvement of the performance of the cells, it is well known. It also involves reducing losses in the module layers. The module layout ensures the reliability and mechanical-chemical durability of the module, but it potentially involves power losses. Optical losses such as absorption and reflections in the optical layers (glass and encapsulant, metallization and electrical interconnection), and electrical losses such as resistive losses due to Joule effect or performance limitation due to unbalances between cells.
Understanding the effects of each of the parameters of a module, and their possible interactions, is a prerequisite for creating always more efficient devices. Modelling allows reducing the size of the experimental plans, by identifying in advance the most favorable areas: this is the field of digital prototyping.
The CEA laboratories at INES build databases and tools for modelling and digital prototyping in order to be able to model the performance of a module, to identify more easily the loss sources, to reduce the size of the experimental plans, and to optimize the architectures.