1 IMPROVEMENT AND VALIDATION OF A TRANSIENT MODEL TO PREDICT PHOTOVOLTAIC MODULE TEMPERATURE

Module temperature is modeled using a transient heat-flow model. Module temperature predicted in this fashion is important in the calculation of cell temperature, a vital input in performance modeling. Parameters important to the model are tested for sensitivity, and optimized to a single day of measured module temperature using simultaneous non-linear least squares regression. These optimized parameters are then tested for accuracy using a year‟s worth of data for one location. The results obtained from this analysis are compared with modeled data from a different site, as well as to results obtained using a steady-state model. We find that the transient model best captures the variability in module temperature, and that the transient model works best when calibrated for a specific location