Whitepaper

In 2021, the term climate change has grown ever more prominent into the public domain and imposed itself on the lives of individuals around the globe. Understanding the causes of climate change has become vital in understanding how we prevent its accelerating nature, specifically how and which human activity is contributing to the imbalances of natural, worldly processes.

We develop roadmaps to transform the all-purpose energy infrastructures (electricity, transportation, heating/cooling, industry, agriculture/forestry/fishing) of 139 countries to ones powered by wind, water, and sunlight (WWS). The roadmaps envision 80% conversion by 2030 and 100% by 2050. WWS not only replaces business-as-usual (BAU) power, but also reduces it ˜42.5% because the work: energy ratio of WWS electricity exceeds that of combustion (23.0%), WWS requires no mining, transporting, or processing of fuels (12.6%), and WWS end-use efficiency is assumed to exceed that of BAU (6.9%). Converting may create ˜24.3 million more permanent, full-time jobs than jobs lost. It may avoid ˜4.6 million/year premature air-pollution deaths today and ˜3.5 million/year in 2050; ˜$22.8 trillion/year (12.7 ¢/kWh-BAU-all-energy) in 2050 air-pollution costs; and ˜$28.5 trillion/year (15.8 ¢/kWh-BAU-all-energy) in 2050 climate costs. Transitioning should also stabilize energy prices because fuel costs are zero, reduce power disruption and increase access to energy by decentralizing power, and avoid 1.5°C global warming.

Becoming increasingly affordable and more reliable than some conventional utilities, PV power is now emerging as the alternative power resource for environmentally-conscious consumers of today. Factors affecting the successful generation of electricity provided by PV modules are now coming under scrutiny in order to enable the accurate forecasting of energy supplies. TÜV Rheinland has set about the task of gathering reliable data to accurately evaluate the impact of spectral effects on PV modules in diverse climate areas.

In order to get the best possible output and, therefore, best return on investment on a yearly and lifetime basis from a photovoltaic module it is necessary to analyze a variety of influencing factors. These are not only related to fundamental material questions but are also related to more practical aspects, such as the working environment in which the module is mounted i.e. the local temperature, wind movement, particulate content of the air, humidity etc. Due to the influence of these factors module performance under real conditions and usage can vary significantly between location and from laboratory tests.