Reliability is King: Mind the Gap for Untapped Potential

With an increased global focus on sustainability and environmental protection, the PV industry faces unprecedented opportunities and challenges. Achieving sustainable development requires improving component reliability and reducing costs, which are crucial for market competitiveness of PV module products.

Traditional double-glass modules use white glaze glass on the back, created through glazing technology before tempering. Due to the heating and cooling of the glazing process weakening the tempered glass, stress caused by outdoor weather exposure may lead to fragmentation, and eventually cracking. The gap film product offers a new solution, allowing the application to tempered glass directly without glazing, maintaining stress uniformity and improving load capacity while reducing the risk of cracking. The gap reflective film also enhances the bifaciality rate by reducing rear cell shielding. This dual benefit makes it a superior alternative to glazed glass.

Currently, there are two types of gap films: metal and non-metal. The metal gap reflective film, however, poses long-term risks, such as insulation failure, power drop, local short circuits, excessive resistance, and potential fire hazards. For this reason, Non-metallic gap film is a better solution for mitigating risk and improving the long-term stability of PV modules.

In conclusion, compared to both the glazed glass and metal gap film solutions, the "non-metal" gap film stands out for its superior reliability. Cybrid Technology's non-metal gap reflective film uses a mature material system and process that has been validated over many years, ensuring reliability for 25-30 years.

Let's consider it from the perspective of cost reduction. Due to the differences in materials and processes, non-metallic gap reflective film has obvious cost reduction advantages over metal reflective film. To avoid insulation risks, module manufacturers need to increase the thickness of the film to improve insulation, leading to an increase in the overall cost of components. Compared with the glazed grid glass solution, it has been calculated that the cost per watt of Cybrid’s White reflective gap film solution can be reduced by 4-5 cm. The addition of the gap film will provide comprehensive net-gain benefits for both module makers and power station operators alike.

In summary, the non-metallic gap reflective film not only meets the requirements of "reliability" and "cost reduction" mentioned above but also plays a role in the power gain of the module. Since the gap reflective film reflects the light at the gap back to the cell, the incident light that is lost from this "crack" is fully utilized. After testing, the Cybrid gap reflective film (white) with innovative composite coating was tested on a 700W module. Compared with the traditional ultra-white glass solution, the module power can be increased by 4-5W, and compared with the glazed grid glass solution, it can be increased by 0.6-0.8W (up to 1.2W), effectively increasing the actual power generation of the terminal power station. In summary, the non-metallic gap reflective film is currently the most reliable and efficient module cell gap solution.

At present, Cybrid Technologies Inc. gap reflective film series products have completed testing in many industry-leading module producers, already being implemented in mass production by some companies. The future will see increasing use of this solution by industry leaders, with Cybrid gap reflective film series products becoming a necessary means to improve module reliability while and reducing costs and increasing efficiency. Cybrid Technologies Inc. has independent intellectual property rights for its non-metallic gap reflective film series products. At present, the second-generation non-metallic gap film solutions an additional increase in reflectivity are under development. Cybrid will continually aspire to follow the path of innovation, continuing to launch more unique solutions that lead the industry.