The Energy and Environmental Performance of Ground-Mounted Photovoltaic Systems—A Timely Update

Enrica Leccisi, Marco Raugei and Vasilis Fthenakis
Additional contact information
Enrica Leccisi: Department of Science and Technology, Parthenope University of Naples, Centro Direzionale-Isola C4, Naples 80143, Italy
Marco Raugei: Department of Mechanical Engineering and Mathematical Sciences, Oxford Brookes University, Wheatley OX33 1HK, UK
Vasilis Fthenakis: Center for Life Cycle Analysis, Columbia University, New York, NY 10027, USA

Energies, 2016, vol. 9, issue 8, 1-13

Abstract: Given photovoltaics’ (PVs) constant improvements in terms of material usage and energy efficiency, this paper provides a timely update on their life-cycle energy and environmental performance. Single-crystalline Si (sc-Si), multi-crystalline Si (mc-Si), cadmium telluride (CdTe) and copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS) systems are analysed, considering the actual country of production and adapting the input electricity mix accordingly. Energy pay-back time ( EPBT ) results for fixed-tilt ground mounted installations range from 0.5 years for CdTe PV at high-irradiation (2300 kWh/(m 2 ·yr)) to 2.8 years for sc-Si PV at low-irradiation (1000 kWh/(m 2 ·yr)), with corresponding quality-adjusted energy return on investment ( EROI PE -eq ) values ranging from over 60 to ~10. Global warming potential (GWP) per kWh el averages out at ~30 g(CO 2 -eq), with lower values (down to ~10 g) for CdTe PV at high irradiation, and up to ~80 g for Chinese sc-Si PV at low irradiation. In general, results point to CdTe PV as the best performing technology from an environmental life-cycle perspective, also showing a remarkable improvement for current production modules in comparison with previous generations. Finally, we determined that one-axis tracking installations can improve the environmental profile of PV systems by approximately 10% for most impact metrics.

Keywords: photovoltaic (PV); crystalline Si (c-Si); cadmium telluride (CdTe); copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS); life cycle assessment (LCA); net energy analysis (NEA); energy return on investment ( EROI ); energy pay-back time ( EPBT ); environmental performance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (33)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/9/8/622/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/9/8/622/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:9:y:2016:i:8:p:622-:d:75558

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().