Methods and techniques to determine the dynamic parameters of solar cells: Review

The new types of solar cells, such as thin film, dye sensitized, organic and multi-junction are increasingly being used. The behavior of these solar cells in dynamic regime differs from the one of the monocrystalline or polycrystalline solar cells. The review article critically outlines and discusses the main issues of the ten methods which have been presented in the research literature in previous years in order to analyze the dynamic behavior of solar cells. This paper presents the methods which allow the determination of either of all ac parameters of solar cells or only one of them. The methods analyzed allow measuring the dynamic impedances using the frequency and time domain techniques. It also discusses the methodologies to determine the dc parameters of solar cells from the variation of the capacitance applying reverse and forward bias. The different types of the solar cells ac equivalent circuits from a proper fitting are also discussed in this review. The paper presents pros and cons for each one of the ten methods allowing the determination of the ac parameters and some dc parameters of solar cells.