Global warming is accelerating due to the use of fossil fuels that have been used continuously for centuries. Now, humankind recognizes its seriousness, and is conducting research on searching for eco-friendly and sustainable energy. In the field of solar energy, which is a kind of eco-friendly and sustainable, many studies are being conducted to enhance the output performance of the module. In this study, the output improvement for the shingled module structure was studied. In order to improve the output performance of the module, the thickness of the encapsulant was increased, and the lamination process conditions have been improved accordingly. After that, the crosslinking rate was analyzed, and the suitability of the lamination process conditions was judged using this. In addition, a peeling test was conducted to analyze the correlation between the adhesion of the encapsulant and the output performance of the module. Finally, the optimization for the encapsulant material and the lamination process conditions for high-power shingled modules was established, and accordingly, the market share of high-power shingled modules in the solar module market can be expected to rise.

Interest and investment in renewable energy have increased worldwide, highlighting the need for renewable energy. Solar energy was the most promising energy of all renewable energy sources, and it has the highest investment value. Because photovoltaics require a certain amount of area for installation, high density and high output performance are required. Shingled module is a promising technology in that they are featured by higher density and higher output compared to the conventional modules. Shingled technology uses a laser scribing to divide solar cells that are to be bonded with electrically conductive adhesive (ECA) to produce and connect strings, which has a higher output in the same area than the conventional modules. In the process of producing solar modules, metal ribbons are used to interconnect cells, but they are also needed for string connections in shingled solar cells. Accordingly, in this study, we researched the interconnection that best suits the connector that joins the string to the string. The module outputs produced under the conditions of the string interconnection were compared and analyzed.

As the demand for new and renewable energy increases due to the depletion of fossil fuels, solar power generation, a core energy source for new and renewable energy, requires research on solar modules for high output power generation. In this paper, the electrical characteristics of solar cell strip at the edge and in the center of single-crystal silicon having a semi-square shape were analyzed. The cell strip located in the center showed the efficiency increase by 0.26% compared to the cell strip at the edge of the solar cell. A shingled photovoltaic module was manufactured for each cell strip. As a result, the output power of the module using the cell strip located in the center was higher by 0.992%.

In this study, we fabricated light-weight solar module for various applications such as building integrated photovoltaics (BIPV), vehicles, trains, etc. Ethylene tetra fluoro ethylene (ETFE) film was applied as a material to replace the cover glass, which occupies more than 65% of the weight of the PV module. Glass fiber reinforced plastic (GRP) was applied to the ones with a low durability by replacing the cover glass to ETFE. Moreover, to achieve a high solar power conversion in this study, we applied a shingled design to weight reduced solar modules. The shingled module with GRP shows 183.7 W of solar-to-power conversion, and the output reduction rate after weight load test was 1.14%.

An increase in the temperature of photovoltaic (PV) modules causes reduced power output and shorter lifetime. Because of these characteristics, demands for the heat dissipation of PV modules are increasing. In this study, we attached a heat dissipation sheet to the back sheet of a shingled PV module and observed the temperature changes. The PV shingled module was tested under Standard Test Conditions (STCs; irradiance: 1,000 W/m², temperature: 25℃, air mass: 1.5) using a solar radiation tester, wherein the temperature of the PV module was measured by irradiating light for a certain duration. As a result, the temperature of the PV module with the heat dissipation sheet decreased by 3℃ compared to that without a heat dissipation sheet. This indicated that the power loss was caused by a temperature increase of the PV module. In addition, it was confirmed that the primary parameter contributing to the reduced PV module output power was the open circuit voltage (Voc).

The high power of a shingled photovoltaic module can be attributed to its low cell-to-module loss. The production of high power modules in limited area requires high efficiency solar cells. Shingled photovoltaic modules can be made by divided solar cells, which can be produced by the laser scribing process. After dividing the 21% PERC cell using laser scribing, the efficiency decreased by approximately 0.35%. However, there was no change in the efficiency of the solar cell having relatively lower efficiency, because the laser scribing process induce higher heat damages in solar cells with high efficiency. To prove this phenomena, the J₀ (leakage current density) of each cell was analyzed. It was found that the J₀ of 21% PERC increased about 17 times between full and divided solar cell. However, the J₀ of 20.2% PERC increased only about 2.5 times between full and divided solar cell.

Recently, with the increase in the use of urban solar power, solar modules are required to produce high power in limited areas. In this report, we proposed the fabrication of a high-power photovoltaic module using shingles technology, and developed accurate string characteristic simulations based on circuit modeling. By comparing the resistance components between the interconnected cells and the cell strips, the ECA resistance was determined to be 0.003 Ω. Based on the equivalent circuit of the modeled shingled string, string simulation was performed according to the type of cell strip. As a result, it was determined that the cell efficiency of the 4-cell strip was the highest at 19.66%, but the efficiency of the string simulated with the 6-cell strip was the highest at 20.48% in the string unit.

A shingled PV module is manufactured by dividing and bonding. In this method, the solar cell is divided by lasers and bonded using electrically conductive adhesives (ECAs). Consequently, the manufacturing cost increases because a process step is added. Therefore, we aim to reduce the production cost by reducing the amount of Ag paste used in the solar cell front. Various electrode structures were designed and simulated. The number of fingers was optimized by designing thinner fingers, and the number of fingers with the maximum power conversion efficiency was confirmed. The simulation confirmed the maximum efficiency in the 4-divided electrode pattern. The amount of Ag paste used for each electrode pattern was calculated and analyzed. The number of fingers was optimized by decreasing the width of the finger; this will not only reduce the amount of Ag paste required but also the increase the efficiency.

Advances in laser technology have enabled ultra-high-speed ultra-precise processing, thus expanding potential applications to the semiconductor, medical, and photovoltaic industries. In particular, laser scribing technology has been applied to the production of shingled solar modules. In this work, we analyze the effect of laser scribing conditions, e.g., scribing depth, on the characteristics of the resulting divided solar cells. When the scribing depth was greater than 100 ㎛, the solar cells were well separated. In addition, the desired scribing depths were reached in fewer scans when the laser spot overlap was 100%. The efficiency of the divided cells decreased due to the high series resistance at scribing depths of less than 100 ㎛. However, at scribing depths of approximately 100 ㎛, the series resistance was low and efficiency reduction was minimized.

The shingled photovoltaic module can be produced by joining divided solar cells into a string of busbarless structure and arranging them in series and parallel to produce a module, in order to produce a high output per unit area. This paper reports a study to optimize solar cell electrode structure for shingled photovoltaic module fabrication. The characteristics of each electrode structure were analyzed according to the simulation program as follow: 80.62% fill factor in the six-junction solar cell electrode structure and 19.23% efficiency in the five-junction electrode structure. Therefore, the split electrode structure optimized for high-density and high-output shingled module fabrication is the five-junction solar cell electrode structure.