Model for Staebler-Wronski Degradation Deduced from Long-Term, Controlled Light-Soaking Experiments

Long-term light-soaking experiments of amorphous silicon photovoltaic modules have now established that stabilization of the degradation occurs at levels that depend significantly on the operating conditions, as well as on the operating history of the modules. We suggest that stabilization occurs because of the introduction of degradation mechanisms with different time constants and annealing activation energies, depending on the exposure conditions. Stabilization will occur once a sufficient accumulation of different degradation mechanisms occurs. We find that operating module temperature during light-soaking is the most important parameter for determining stabilized performance. Next in importance is the exposure history of the device. The precise value of the light intensity seems least important in determining the stabilized efficiency, as long as its level is a significant fraction of 1-sun.