AUO is a player in solar cell and module manufacturing, but in recent years, manufacturing has increasingly evolved into a very commoditized part of the business. The real profits from many vertically integrated companies like AUO come from the engineer, procurement and construction, or EPC, and the operate and maintain, or O&M, parts of the business.
Just the same, AUO continues to innovate in its solar modules and brought out its new 12 buss bar solar modules to the show.
The increase in the number of buss bars, which are the wires you can see running across each of the solar cells inside of a solar module, reduce the internal resistance of the module, resulting in a net increase in the output. That translates to higher wattage ratings for its panels, which have been improved even further with their half-cut cells. Perhaps counter-intuitively, cutting the standard solar cells physically in half results in even less internal resistance, further increasing the output of the now 120 half-cut cell panels to an impressive 335 watts per panel.
In terms of floating solar farm solutions, installations over water increase the complexity of the installation and maintenance, not to mention the challenges of running electrical generating equipment power lines in, around, or over water. Having said that, many companies see the tech as having potential but that the market for over-water installations is still maturing.
One key benefit of installing over water that some manufacturers are looking at comes from installing bifacial solar panels in floating installations and capturing reflected solar light that bounces up off of the water. Bifacial panels are solar panels that have solar cells laminated between two panes of glass and are designed to generate power from both sides of the solar cell. Bifacial panels can capture up to 80% of the reflected light off of the water, resulting in increases in system output of 20-50% over traditional solar panels.
AUO also brought its new wireless Sensing Tree to the show, which it has designed to be installed alongside solar farms to give owners insight into relevant conditions at the solar farm. The AUO Sensing Tree captures relevant weather metrics like the solar radiation, temperature, humidity, and wind to allow owners to track and correlate weather factors to total system output. The data is then recorded and sent up to the web with AUO’s Data Recorder.
Source: Clean Technica
Wayne Lin (waynelin@taitra.org.tw)
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