In this study, 20.8% of a p-type Si bifacial solar cell was used to develop a photovoltaic (PV) module to obtain the maximum power under a limited installation area. The transparent back sheet material was replaced during fabrication with a white one, which is opaque in commercial products. This is very beneficial for the generation of more electricity, owing to the additional power generation via absorption of light from the rear side. A new model is suggested herein to predict the power of the bifacial PV module by considering the backside reflections from the roof and/or environment. This model considers not only the frontside reflection, but also the nonuniformity of the backside light sources. Theoretical predictions were compared to experimental data to prove the validity of this model, the error range for which ranged from 0.32% to 8.49%. Especially, under 700 W/m2, the error rate was as low as 2.25%. This work could provide theoretical and experimental bases for application to a distributed and microgrid network.
