Hi: This thread reminded me of an article I saw about 2 years ago, where the researcher had compiled a graph of solar module start-ups per year up until 2012, with the limiting constraint that the companies had to UL 1703 listed and qualify for the California Solar Initiative.
Virtually all the companies started their business less than 10 years ago during the first boom in the second half of the 2000's. Only three have actually been through a 25 year warranty period. JARMO _____________________________________________________________________________________ Jarmo Venalainen | Schneider Electric | Xantrex Brand | CANADA | Sales Application Engineer Phone: +604-422-2528 | Tech Support: 800-670-0707 | Mobile: +604-505-0291 Email: jarmo.venalai...@schneider-electric.com | Site: www.Xantrex.com | Address: 3700 Gilmore Way, Burnaby, BC V5G4M1 *** Please consider the environment before printing this e-mail From: "b...@midnitesolar.com" <b...@midnitesolar.com> To: RE-wrenches <re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org>, Date: 07/18/2015 11:09 AM Subject: Re: [RE-wrenches] Trina Module Annual Degradation Sent by: "RE-wrenches" <re-wrenches-boun...@lists.re-wrenches.org> Hi Bill From what I understand, and I have asked this question to different people at different companies, the 25 year warranty people hear about concerning PV is not for a broken panel within 25 years but the degradation in performance over the years. If a PV module just plain old "breaks" (goes to zero output) in, say 20 years and it has a 25 year degradation warranty, the PV manufacturer, (if still in business), is not obligated to replace the defective module.... ...Even if it resulted from a factory defect. I do not know what the warranty period is for manufacturing defects. I hear warranty times of around 10 years. I am not exactly sure on that though. Having said all this, there are companies that do replace modules after their short term memory is up due to manufacturing defects. Kyocera comes to mind immediately. These are typically larger companies from what I see. I'm just repeating what I have heard over the years regarding PV. It just seems to me somewhat misleading the words "25 year warranty". There may be some companies that actually DO offer a full 25 yr. warranty these days but what if they aren't around before then ? I bet that Bill Hoffer could offer way better information than I can about this. boB On 7/18/2015 3:29 AM, solar1onl...@charter.net wrote: boB, Can you expand on the warranty coverage in this situation? TIA, Bill ----------------------------------------- From: "b...@midnitesolar.com" To: "RE-wrenches" Cc: Sent: Thu, 16 Jul 2015 19:01:32 -0700 Subject: Re: [RE-wrenches] Trina Module Annual Degradation It's too bad that when a module goes to a REAL high degradation, like, 100% down to nothing before that 25 year "warranty" is up, that it is NOT considered degradation and is not covered under "warranty". P.S. This has nothing to do with Trina or any PV company in particular. boB On 7/16/2015 6:24 PM, jay wrote: > HI Peter, > > I’ll bite. > > From the folks I know who deal with multi mega watt systems, are seeing less than that level of degradation. > > That said, the standard module 25 yr warranty to 80% is just on .7% year if I have my math correct. > > jay > > peltz power > > > > >> On Jul 16, 2015, at 9:08 AM, Peter Parrish <peter.parr...@calsolareng.com> wrote: >> >> I have recently been in discussion with a company that builds a large number >> of medium-sized PV ground mount system (30 kW to over 100 kW). They claim >> that they have been seeing something on the order of 0.7% annual degradation >> in the output of their systems due to intrinsic degradation in the PV >> modules. They also claim that this number is supported by the PV module >> manufacturer. Many years ago (2007?) I remember reading a report containing >> data gathered by NREL that showed the number was about 0.4%, and I thought >> the number was actually decreasing over time. >> >> The module in question is the Trina TSM-310 (PA14.8, I believe, if it makes >> any difference). >> >> Has anyone read anything recent about annual degradation in general or Trina >> modules in particular? >> >> - Peter >> >> Peter T. Parrish, Ph.D. >> President, SolarGnosis >> 1107 Fair Oaks Ave. Suite 351 >> South Pasadena, CA 91030 >> NABCEP Certified PV Installer #031806-26 >> (323) 839-6108 >> peter...@pobox.com >> >> ____________ ______________________________________________________________________ This email has been scanned by the Symantec Email Security.cloud service. ______________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________ List sponsored by Redwood Alliance List Address: RE-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org Change listserver email address & settings: http://lists.re-wrenches.org/options.cgi/re-wrenches-re-wrenches.org List-Archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/re-wrenches@lists.re-wrenches.org/maillist.html List rules & etiquette: www.re-wrenches.org/etiquette.htm Check out or update participant bios: www.members.re-wrenches.org
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