Question
Asked 14th Jul, 2015

How much is the at least irradiation for the photovoltaic panels?

Hello;
I want to know the minimum and maximum irradiation and temperature, which is necessary to operate the photovoltaic panels?
thanks.

Most recent answer

Samaila Adamu
Federal University, Kashere, Gombe State
@Archana Laxmankumar B.
You said
"Minimum solar insolation required to generate electricty is 100 -200 W/m2, which sufficient to run at least one light and fan" Please any reference material to support that ? I Will be glad to have it
1 Recommendation

All Answers (18)

Pradeep Chandra Pant
Ministry of New And Renewable Energy ,New Delhi, India
Solar Photovoltaic cells,modules are rated for 1000W/m2, AM1.5global and 250 c cell temperature. the performance of the cell/module vary proportionately  for incoming solar radiation  intensity. 
1 Recommendation
Sajjad Malek
University of Isfahan
Thank you.
But my mean is the usual operating conditions which is considered in PV inverters design.
and Is there a minimum radiation in inverter design?
1 Recommendation
Paolo Bombelli
University of Cambridge
Dear Sajjad,
I suspect the answer to your question will be "it depends".
Having said that, I will follow with interest this topic as someone might have some quantitative answer. 
Unfortunately I am not able to help directly too much but I am actually thanks you for posing this question. There is just one think that I could suggest - perhaps you could check where are placed the northers (or southeast) PV solar park and then check the minimum, average and maximum solar radiation in those areas. There is an avalable  list in Wikipedia (Canada has at least a large PV solar park in the south of the country).
Best,
Paolo.
1 Recommendation
Paolo Bombelli
University of Cambridge
Dear Sajjad,
I suspect the answer to your question will be "it depends".
Having said that, I will follow with interest this topic as someone might have some quantitative answer. 
Unfortunately I am not able to help directly too much but I am actually thanks you for posing this question. There is just one think that I could suggest - perhaps you could check where are placed the northers (or southeast) PV solar park and then check the minimum, average and maximum solar radiation in those areas. There is an avalable  list in Wikipedia (Canada has at least a large PV solar park in the south of the country).
Best,
Paolo.
1 Recommendation
 I do not think there is a minimum irradiation or temperature which is necessary to operate PV panels. However, there is a temperature effect which comes into play. As the irradiation increases, there is a tendency for the ambient temperature to increase too. PV cells' performances are affected by temperature because the dark current density produced by the cell has a strong temperature dependence. The performance drops with increase in temperature for instance, for a polycrystalline PV cell, if the temperature decreases by 1oC, the voltage developed increases by 0.12V.  The PV cells are specified at NOCT of 25oC at 1000 W/m2 but in some environments, the cells can reach a temperature in excess of 90oC. This seriously affects the output. I hope this will be of help. 
1 Recommendation
MaoYi Chang
Sinogreenergy
It depends on PV project site (location weather condition) and system structure  (inverter/module). Perhapes you would try simulation software (eg. PVSyst)  to get brief system performance for specific project site and system structure.
1 Recommendation
Sajjad Malek
University of Isfahan
Thanks for all your answers.
2 Recommendations
Muhammad Asim
University of Engineering and Technology, Lahore
@k.sudhakar, thanks for your input. could you please provide the reference for this data.
Samuel Lakew
University of Nottingham
As many of the researchers have suggested, it depends on the type of the PV panel. If you take the silicon PV cell panels, which are not efficient totally depends on the amount of irradiation available on a given area. As the resource is lower, at some point the panels stop generating power and you can say that point is the minimum range of the resource. But remember this value is not fixed for all PV cell types and for all places. If you take a more efficient PV like Nano Solar paint, they produce power  at very minimum irradiation.
i have seen some interesting simulations in this page
Naveed Ahmad
Lahore University of Management Sciences
solar cell not depend upon the temperature at high temperature its quality and efficiency get lower. its depend upon irradiance value under standard solar cell efficiency reach up to 31% if irradiance reach to 1000 watt/m2 at 1.5AM.
If one can use micro-inverter or DC DC converters, it is possible to extract even 1 W of power from PV panels with 60 cells (I am referring to m-Si). However the inclined global irradiation should be around 50 W /m2.
Archana Laxmankumar Belge
Thakur College of Engineering and Technology
Minimum solar insolation required to generate electricty is 100 -200 W/m2, which sufficient to run at least one light and fan.
Shahram Montaser Kouhsari
Amirkabir University of Technology
Try POUYA real time simulator to find out more about PV performance.
1 Recommendation
Samaila Adamu
Federal University, Kashere, Gombe State
Thanks shahram montaser kouhsari
Samaila Adamu
Federal University, Kashere, Gombe State
@Archana Laxmankumar B.
You said
"Minimum solar insolation required to generate electricty is 100 -200 W/m2, which sufficient to run at least one light and fan" Please any reference material to support that ? I Will be glad to have it
1 Recommendation

Similar questions and discussions

Related Publications

Conference Paper
In the case of malfunctioning of industrial installations, symptoms appear, which take the form of noise, vibrations, smoke…
Article
British engineer A.S.E. Ackermann contributed significantly to practical applications of solar thermal energy in the early part of this century. The present paper is an excerpt from a much longer article that appeared in 1915. Ackermann offers here a historical review of the work of early solar energy pioneers, including a few of his contemporaries...
Got a technical question?
Get high-quality answers from experts.