2015 Inverter Workshop

Wednesday, February 25, 2015
Chair: Jack Flicker

In parallel with the module-focused PVQAT workshop, this workshop was devoted to presentations and discussions about inverters. This workshop represented a follow-on to the inverter workshops that Sandia National Laboratories has hosted in the past, but was collocated with the 2015 PVMRW Sessions to better facilitate conversations between module and inverter experts.

Agenda

For a detailed schedule of the day's events, access the agenda.

Each session consisted of three 15-minute talks followed by a half-hour of open Q&A with the panel.

This event is part of the 2015 Photovoltaic Module Reliability Workshop, which is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Energy Technologies Office.

Presentations

The presentations listed are available as Adobe Acrobat PDFs. Discussion notes for the Utility-Scale Inverter session are also available.

Presentation of Survey Results — Jack Flicker

Utility-Scale Inverters—Greg Ball (Chair), DNV GL

• Inverter Reliability—Matt Ursino, Solectria
• Accelerated Reliability Testing of Commercial and Utility PV Inverters—Ron Vidano, Advanced Energy

Module Level Power Electronics—Jack Flicker (Chair), Sandia National Laboratories

• Standardization and Reliability Testing of Module-Level Power Electronics (MLPE)—Govindasamy Tamizhmani, TUV PTL
• Reliability Overview for Electronic Systems in Solar Applications—Eric Boskin, Maxim Integrated
• Managing Large Inverter Fleets—Mark Baldassari, Enphase Energy

Advanced Inverter Functionality—Faraz Ebneali (Chair), ReneSola

• Smart Inverter Grid Support Functions and Potential Impact on Reliability—Aminul Huque, EPRI
• The Impact of Smart Inverters: How Rule and Regulation Will Transform DG into Smart Systems—John Berdner, Enphase Energy

Failure Modes—Chris Deline (Chair), NREL

• IGBT Failure Modes in Inverters—Diganta Das, CALCE
• Corrosion of Electronics—Rob Sorensen, Sandia National Laboratories
• Nanocoatings: The Solution to All of Our Environmental Protection Problems?—Greg Caswell, DfR Solutions

Accelerated Testing —Tim Peshek (Chair), Case Western Reserve University

• PV Inverter Accelerated Testing for High-Humidity Environments—Paul Parker, SunPower
• Michael Mills-Price, DNV GL
• Predictive Reliability Modeling for Inverters Based on Electro-Thermal Phenomena—Ken Armijo, Sandia National Laboratories

Posters

The posters listed are available as Adobe Acrobat PDFs.

• Arc Fault Photovoltaic Reliability and Plasma Physics of Failure Investigations—Kenneth Armijo, Jay Johnson, Benjamin Yang, Michael Hibbs and Richard Harrison
• Sustainability through Product Quality and Compliance—Faraz Ebneali
• A Seat at the "Big Table": Temporal Analytics of Inverter Performance—Timothy J. Peshek, Mohammad A. Hossain, Roger H. French