Solar Photovoltaic Industry Chain Terminology-I
Overview of the Photovoltaic Industry Chain Glossary
How much do you know about the terms related to the photovoltaic industry?
1、General Terms
Photovoltaic effect, photovoltaic or solar photovoltaic panels
The phenomenon in which an object generates an electric potential due to the absorption of a photon, an effect in which the state of charge distribution within an object changes to produce an electric potential and current when the object is illuminated by light, known as the photovoltaic effect.
Photovoltaic power generation
Utilizing the photovoltaic effect, the sun's energy is directly converted into electrical power generation technology.
Power: watt (W), kilowatt (KW), megawatt (MW), gigawatt (GW), terawatt (TW)
The power unit of electricity, a measure of the power generation capacity of a PV power plant.
1TW = 1,000GW = 1,000,000MW = 1,000,000,000kW = 1,000,000,000,000W
Kilowatt-hour (KWh)
A unit of electrical energy, 1 KWh of electricity is one kilowatt-hour of electricity.
Installed capacity
Solar cells are connected in series and then encapsulated to form a large-area solar cell module, which, together with power controllers and other components, forms a photovoltaic power generation device. The power generated by such a device is the installed capacity.
Capacity Ratio
The ratio of the module capacity to the inverter capacity of a PV power plant.
Average Conversion Efficiency
The average photoelectric conversion efficiency is a measure of a solar cell's ability to convert light energy into electricity.
Levelized Cost of Energy
Levelized Cost of Energy, abbreviated as LCOE, is the present value of cost over the life cycle of a project, i.e., present value of cost over the life cycle/present value of electricity generation over the life cycle, calculated after levelizing the cost and electricity generation over the life cycle of the project.
Feed-in Tariff
Includes two meanings of generation-side parity and user-side parity: generation-side parity refers to the fact that PV power generation can realize reasonable profit even if it is purchased according to the feed-in tariff of traditional energy sources (without subsidy); user-side parity refers to the fact that PV power generation cost is lower than the price of electricity sales, which can be divided into industrial and commercial and residential user-side parity according to the types of users and their different costs of purchasing electricity.
Benchmark feed-in tariffs, feed-in tariffs
The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) formulates the purchase price (including tax) of grid-connected electricity generated by centralized PV power plants by grid companies.
Semiconductor material
Utilization hours of power generation equipment
Refers to the average full-load operation time of a generating unit in 1 year; in 8760h per year, the utilization hours of power generation equipment.
A material whose conductivity is between that of a conductor and an insulator.
Double Reverse” Investigation
Simultaneous anti-dumping and countervailing investigations of the same product from one (or several) country or region.
Photovoltaic Power Generation Leader Program
This refers to the photovoltaic support program implemented by China's National Energy Administration (NEA) since 2015, which aims to promote technological progress, industrial upgrading and cost reduction in photovoltaic power generation. Pacesetter advanced technology products are required to meet specified technological advancement indexes and other requirements
High-purity crystalline silicon
High-purity monomaterial silicon metal with a purity greater than 99.999999999%.
2.Polysilicon, silicon material
Polycrystalline silicon, silicon material
A form of monolithic silicon, polycrystalline silicon grains of a certain size, each grain of silicon with different crystal orientation, polysilicon is the main raw material for photovoltaic cells and semiconductor equipment. According to purity, polysilicon can be categorized into solar grade (photovoltaic grade) polysilicon and electronic grade (semiconductor grade) polysilicon.
Monocrystalline Silicon Wafers
Polycrystalline silicon products used for monocrystalline silicon drawing and production of monocrystalline silicon wafers Polycrystalline silicon wafers material refers to polycrystalline silicon products used for polycrystalline ingot casting and production of polycrystalline silicon wafers
Industrial silicon powder, silicon powder
Products smelted from silicon ore and carbonaceous reductants in mineral heat furnaces, mainly composed of elemental silicon, which is the main raw material for polysilicon.
Trichlorohydrosilicon, TCS
Silicon compounds synthesized from industrial silicon powder and hydrogen chloride, can be reduced by hydrogen at about 1100 ℃ to a single silicon, is the company's production of polysilicon intermediates, the chemical formula for the SiHCl3, English name Trichlorosilane.
Silicon tetrachloride, TET, STC
It is a by-product of the polysilicon production process, such as the synthesis of trichlorosilane and the reduction of trichlorosilane, and can be prepared by the cold hydrogenation process of trichlorosilane, with the chemical formula of SiCl4 and the English name of SiliconTetrachloride.
Dichlorodihydrosilicon, DCS
The by-products of the polysilicon production process, such as the synthesis, cold hydrogenation and reduction of trichlorohydrosilicon, can be disproportionated with silicon tetrachloride under the condition of catalyst to produce silicon trichloride, the chemical formula is SiH2Cl2, the English name is DichIorosilane.
Siemens Method
The Siemens method is the original process for producing polysilicon, which is a production process that uses hydrogen to reduce high-purity silicon trichlorohydride, and deposits polysilicon on a silicon core heated to about 1,100 °C.
Modified Siemens Process
Currently the most mainstream and mature polysilicon production process at home and abroad, also known as the “closed-loop Siemens method”. It is mainly based on the Siemens method with the addition of tail gas recovery and silicon tetrachloride hydrogenation process, realizing the closed-loop cycle of the production process, avoiding the direct emission of by-products to pollute the environment, and realizing the recycling of raw materials, which effectively reduces the production cost.
Silane fluidized bed method
One of the polysilicon production process. Silane fluidized bed method is based on silicon tetrachloride, hydrogen, hydrogen chloride and industrial silicon as raw materials in the fluidized bed (boiling bed) at high temperature and high pressure to generate trichlorohydrosilicon, trichlorohydrosilicon further disproportionation and hydrogenation to generate dichlorodihydrosilicon, followed by the generation of silane gas. The produced silane gas is passed into the fluidized bed reactor with small particles of silicon powder for continuous thermal decomposition reaction to produce granular polysilicon products.
Next time we'll look at the “wafer link” of solar panels.
Featured Products
Follow us ! TEEJOIN SOLAR
