Performance of a PV panel under different shading strengths

Abstract

Solar radiation and the surface temperature of a PV panel are the two key parameters that play an important role in the performance of the PV panel. The shading on the panel surface reduces the solar radiation falling on its surface, thus degrading the panel performance. Moreover, the effect of shading is also influenced by the panel configuration. The performance of the PV panel under different levels of shading strength and panel configuration is the main focus of this study. It was reported that, due to 50% shading of a single cell, the reduction in maximum power output was 25.71%. Similarly, the reduction in maximum power output was 70.27% with 50% shading of the panel surface. Further, in this study, the reduction in the PV panel power output was reported as 16.54% and 6.03% for the series and parallel configuration, under the same level of shading condition. © 2017, © 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.