Another market area with great potential for Rustech® is the Solar Heating Industry, now widely used in homes, large companies, hotels, resorts and aquatic clubs. The popularity of solar panels is in great expansion; Researchers from industry, academia, and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) (Washington, DC) are working together on several new projects to research the corrosion of solar cells, with a goal of developing longer-lasting photovoltaic (PV) panels.
According to Sandia National Laboratories (Albuquerque, New Mexico), one of the leading partners on the program, corrosion can degrade many critical electronics and connections in these solar panels.
“It’s challenging to predict, and even more challenging to design ways to reduce it, because it’s highly dependent on material and environmental conditions,” says Eric Schindelholz, a Sandia materials reliability researcher who studies corrosion and how it affects PV system performance. One particular challenge comes in reproducing the relevant environmental conditions to properly study how materials corrode in that setting.
“Along the coast of Florida, it’s humidity and sea salt in the air,” Schindelholz says. “In Albuquerque, we have high ultraviolet (UV) radiation, so UV might be one of the important parameters here. The parameters driving corrosion shift with location and materials. The challenge lies in identifying the important parameters—and then tuning the knobs in the lab to get something that replicates what we see in an outdoor environment.”
The electrical components in solar cells are initially protected from corrosion by encapsulating polymers, sealants, and glass. But water vapor and corrosive gases can eventually permeate those barriers as the materials and packaging degrade, according to Sandia’s researchers. (source:renewableenergyworld)
Rustech® can provide longevity to the solar panels by extending their lifecycle and providing consistent output by reducing the effects of corrosion within the different metal components adherent to the actual cells. Rustech® has also been installed and tested on saltwater tanks, protecting the internal and external break and preserving the pH of the water, which usually has its properties changed due to the presence of iron ions.
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