Study on influence of desert environment on photovoltaic modules

In the desert area, the relative humidity, temperature, wind speed, atmospheric pressure and radiation intensity were monitored in real time for one year, and the relationship between environmental parameters and radiation intensity was analyzed. Simulate the desert environment in the wind tunnel, test the output power of photovoltaic modules in the process of different dust concentration and the output power after the dust settling on the surface of photovoltaic modules, and make a comparative analysis of the power loss rates of the two. Experiments were conducted in the laboratory to analyze the influence of different dust concentrations on the transmittance. The results show that: 1) the relative humidity is highly correlated with the radiation intensity, and the power loss rate of photovoltaic modules increases when the relative humidity is increased under the condition that dust accumulates on the photovoltaic modules' surface. 2) the influence of dust settling on the surface of photovoltaic modules on power loss rate is higher than that of photovoltaic modules with dust concentration in the air. 3) with the increase of dust concentration, the transmittance decreased with a minimum decrease of 16%. © 2020, Editorial Board of Acta Energiae Solaris Sinica. All right reserved.