IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jeners/v17y2024i2p482-d1322026.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Environmental Product Declarations as a Data Source for the Assessment of Environmental Impacts during the Use Phase of Photovoltaic Modules: Critical Issues and Potential

Author

Listed:
  • Giuseppe Piras

    (Department of Astronautical, Electrical and Energy Engineering, Sapienza University of Rome, 00184 Rome, Italy)

  • Adriana Scarlet Sferra

    (Department of Planning Design and Technology of Architecture, Sapienza University of Rome, 00196 Rome, Italy)

Abstract

In the context of policies promoting renewable energies for decarbonization, energy transition and the development of energy communities, photovoltaic systems require special attention. Even for these systems, it is legitimate to inquire about the correlation, currently carried out through life cycle analysis, between benefits and environmental impacts. To maintain long-term productivity levels and ensure the proper functioning of the system, maintenance interventions are necessary. While these interventions guarantee performance, they also have repercussions for the environment. This study aims to assess the environmental impacts caused by ordinary and extraordinary maintenance interventions, taking into account specific factors, during the 30-year operational phase. To evaluate these impacts, this study verifies the feasibility of using data from Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) and the Product Category Rules (PCR) as reference. The initial results highlight, on the one hand, among the main issues, the importance that all EPDs attribute to the impacts caused by water consumption during the use phase of the PV modules, and on the other hand, some critical issues mainly due to the lack of data relating to the installation site necessary for the correct planning of maintenance activities. Finally, the study presents some reflections for a potential recalibration of the PCR and their associated EPDs.

Suggested Citation

  • Giuseppe Piras & Adriana Scarlet Sferra, 2024. "Environmental Product Declarations as a Data Source for the Assessment of Environmental Impacts during the Use Phase of Photovoltaic Modules: Critical Issues and Potential," Energies, MDPI, vol. 17(2), pages 1-19, January.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:17:y:2024:i:2:p:482-:d:1322026
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/17/2/482/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/17/2/482/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Klugmann-Radziemska, Ewa, 2015. "Degradation of electrical performance of a crystalline photovoltaic module due to dust deposition in northern Poland," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 418-426.
    2. Micheli, Leonardo & Theristis, Marios & Talavera, Diego L. & Almonacid, Florencia & Stein, Joshua S. & Fernandez, Eduardo F., 2020. "Photovoltaic Cleaning Frequency Optimization Under Different Degradation Rate Patterns," MPRA Paper 105008, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 07 Oct 2020.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Guan, Yanling & Zhang, Hao & Xiao, Bin & Zhou, Zhi & Yan, Xuzhou, 2017. "In-situ investigation of the effect of dust deposition on the performance of polycrystalline silicon photovoltaic modules," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 1273-1284.
    2. Lisa B. Bosman & Walter D. Leon-Salas & William Hutzel & Esteban A. Soto, 2020. "PV System Predictive Maintenance: Challenges, Current Approaches, and Opportunities," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(6), pages 1-16, March.
    3. Romero-Fiances, Irene & Livera, Andreas & Theristis, Marios & Makrides, George & Stein, Joshua S. & Nofuentes, Gustavo & de la Casa, Juan & Georghiou, George E., 2022. "Impact of duration and missing data on the long-term photovoltaic degradation rate estimation," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 181(C), pages 738-748.
    4. Zhang, Jie & Zhou, Chuande & Tang, Yike & Zheng, Fuzhong & Meng, Minghui & Miao, Chunzheng, 2018. "Criteria for particles to be levitated and to move continuously on traveling-wave electric curtain for dust mitigation on solar panels," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 410-420.
    5. Conceição, Ricardo & González-Aguilar, José & Merrouni, Ahmed Alami & Romero, Manuel, 2022. "Soiling effect in solar energy conversion systems: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).
    6. Yao, Wanxiang & Kong, Xiangru & Xu, Ai & Xu, Puyan & Wang, Yan & Gao, Weijun, 2023. "New models for the influence of rainwater on the performance of photovoltaic modules under different rainfall conditions," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 173(C).
    7. Lucia Cattani & Paolo Cattani & Anna Magrini, 2021. "Photovoltaic Cleaning Optimization: A Simplified Theoretical Approach for Air to Water Generator (AWG) System Employment," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(14), pages 1-17, July.
    8. Kumar, Manish & Kumar, Arun, 2017. "Performance assessment and degradation analysis of solar photovoltaic technologies: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 554-587.
    9. Weiliang Liu & Changliang Liu & Yongjun Lin & Liangyu Ma & Feng Xiong & Jintuo Li, 2018. "Ultra-Short-Term Forecast of Photovoltaic Output Power under Fog and Haze Weather," Energies, MDPI, vol. 11(3), pages 1-22, February.
    10. Borislav Stankov & Angel Terziev & Momchil Vassilev & Martin Ivanov, 2024. "Influence of Wind and Rainfall on the Performance of a Photovoltaic Module in a Dusty Environment," Energies, MDPI, vol. 17(14), pages 1-29, July.
    11. Abdulla, Hind & Sleptchenko, Andrei & Nayfeh, Ammar, 2024. "Photovoltaic systems operation and maintenance: A review and future directions," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 195(C).
    12. Karim Menoufi, 2017. "Dust Accumulation on the Surface of Photovoltaic Panels: Introducing the Photovoltaic Soiling Index (PVSI)," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(6), pages 1-12, June.
    13. Jha, Aprajeeta & Tripathy, P.P., 2019. "Heat transfer modeling and performance evaluation of photovoltaic system in different seasonal and climatic conditions," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 856-865.
    14. Carmen Otilia Rusănescu & Marin Rusănescu & Irina Aura Istrate & Gabriel Alexandru Constantin & Mihaela Begea, 2023. "The Effect of Dust Deposition on the Performance of Photovoltaic Panels," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(19), pages 1-20, September.
    15. Zhang, Yijie & Ma, Tao & Yang, Hongxing & Li, Zongyu & Wang, Yuhong, 2023. "Simulation and experimental study on the energy performance of a pre-fabricated photovoltaic pavement," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 342(C).
    16. Chen, Jinxin & Pan, Guobing & Ouyang, Jing & Ma, Jin & Fu, Lei & Zhang, Libin, 2020. "Study on impacts of dust accumulation and rainfall on PV power reduction in East China," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 194(C).
    17. Sergio Bemposta Rosende & Javier Sánchez-Soriano & Carlos Quiterio Gómez Muñoz & Javier Fernández Andrés, 2020. "Remote Management Architecture of UAV Fleets for Maintenance, Surveillance, and Security Tasks in Solar Power Plants," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(21), pages 1-23, November.
    18. Tuhibur Rahman & Ahmed Al Mansur & Molla Shahadat Hossain Lipu & Md. Siddikur Rahman & Ratil H. Ashique & Mohamad Abou Houran & Rajvikram Madurai Elavarasan & Eklas Hossain, 2023. "Investigation of Degradation of Solar Photovoltaics: A Review of Aging Factors, Impacts, and Future Directions toward Sustainable Energy Management," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(9), pages 1-30, April.
    19. Eke, R. & Betts, T.R. & Gottschalg, R.,, 2017. "Spectral irradiance effects on the outdoor performance of photovoltaic modules," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 429-434.
    20. Chanchangi, Yusuf N. & Ghosh, Aritra & Sundaram, Senthilarasu & Mallick, Tapas K., 2020. "Dust and PV Performance in Nigeria: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 121(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:17:y:2024:i:2:p:482-:d:1322026. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.