Page 18 - North American Clean Energy July August 2015

solar energy

New ASTM Standard

Simpliies an Important

PV Module Qualiication

Stress Test
By Jeffrey Quill

Photovoltaic modules being tested outdoors for their resistance to the damaging efects of
sunlight.

he photovoltaic energy industry has a new tool for

performing stress tests on modules, mini-modules, or

components. ASTM E3006 is a recently published standard
from ASTM Committee E44 on Solar, Geothermal, and

Other Alternative Energy Sources. he new standard

provides a test method for ultraviolet light exposures. he
background of the creation of the standard is illustrative

of the value that diferent standards development

organizations (SDOs) bring to the industry.

International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) 61215 and 61646 are widely

recognized qualiication standards for deining the performance characteristics of
most of the world's photovoltaic energy products. hese documents, and dozens
that support them, deine characterization and stress tests designed to ensure the

functionality of modules used in their intended environments. One of the important
stress tests required by these standards is called ultraviolet (UV) conditioning.
hese tests were inserted into the qualiication test sequence to address the rapid
degradation of polymeric materials from UV light that was observed in some modules.

Although the UV stress is deined, the standards ofer little guidance on how to actually
perform a test to meet the requirements. ASTM E3006 ills this gap by leveraging well-
known technology from ASTM G154 to perform one component of the photovoltaic
module design qualiication test sequence.

Because the IEC technical committee responsible for 61215 and 61646 (TC 82,
Working Group 2) is tasked with addressing a huge array of concerns, it often refers to
standards from ASTM or other organizations to ill in gaps in its standards and avoid
duplication of eforts. In the case of the UV conditioning test, ASTM is unique in the

SDO world because it has an entire technical committee, G03, tasked with writing
weathering standards. his test essentially is a subset of the ield of weathering, and
so ASTM had resources in place to assist with the development of a standard involving

18 JULY/AUGUST 2015
nacleanenergy.com