Photovoltaic Panels’ Thermo-Mechanical Delamination by Electric Resistive Heating

The present study investigates the application of electric resistive heating to photovoltaic (PV) panels, aimed at enabling their subsequent thermo-mechanical delamination. The key process parameters—namely current magnitude and applied voltage—required for direct electro-resistive heating are identified, and the process is experimentally demonstrated under laboratory conditions. The electric resistive heating of a composite photovoltaic panel, consisting of a solar cell layer (crystalline silicon, c-Si, with a metallic grid), a backsheet, and a glass layer, is analyzed in detail using a virtual model of a single-crystal silicon solar cell implemented as coupled electric-thermal analysis. The temperature dependence of the electrical resistance of the solar cell layer is experimentally measured, and exponential relationships are derived and subsequently incorporated into the numerical model. The virtual model results are validated, demonstrating that, for a given geometry and configuration of the conductive metallic grid (busbars and fingers), the electrical resistance of the semiconductor layer containing the p–n junction governs the temperature achieved during electro-resistive heating as a function of the applied current. Furthermore, results for the terminal current and voltage, current density in the busbars and fingers, electric field intensity, and the resulting temperature within the semiconductor layer of the single-crystal silicon solar cell are presented and analyzed.