ENGAGE™ PV Polyolefin Elastomers
Creating more innovative solar panels to harness more power
ENGAGE™ PV Polyolefin Elastomers (POE) support photovoltaic (PV) modules with exceptional protection, long-term performance and reliability at a lower overall system lifetime cost. This helps businesses create more innovative solar panels and harness more power to drive success for many years.
ENGAGE™ PV POE attributes
While materials like ethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA) have long been used for encapsulants, they degrade over time, releasing corrosive acetic acid and yellowing, which negatively impacts PV module power output. Dow designed ENGAGE™ PV POEs to offer excellent performance compared to most competing encapsulant materials, including PID-Free EVA Encapsulants.
Dow offers various grades of ENGAGE™ PV POE designed to meet a wide variety of application needs, including commercial, residential or utility projects. Fabrication advantages include:
- Optimized glass/glass film for crystalline silicon (c-Si)
- Low UV cut-off film
- Standard UV cut-off film
Power retention
ENGAGE™ PV POE has been tested extensively to ensure its exceptional performance over time. Third-party testing by Fraunhofer showed ENGAGE™ PV POEs exhibited virtually no PID during service life, with a power loss of 0.3% versus 35% with EVA-based film.¹
Weathering and encapsulant film degradation
After alternating cycles of damp heat and QUV exposure over extended periods of time, a module built with ENGAGE™ PV POE film showed more consistent power compared to a module using EVA films. Even after 10,000 hours of Xenon Arc weathering testing, encapsulant films made with ENGAGE™ PV POEs exhibited no increased yellowness, while EVA film turned an evident yellow color.²
Field testing of PV encapsulate films
Dow has installed solar modules in Hainan to test and generate long-term data on the reliability and power generation capabilities of ENGAGE™ PV POE films. The site contains a total of nine different strings: three strings of PERC modules with POE, EPE, and EVA films; three strings of TOPCon modules with POE, EPE, and EVA films; and three strings of HJT modules with POE, EPE, and EVA films. The data collected from this site allows us to demonstrate the high reliability of our high-efficiency bifacial modules using ENGAGE™ PV POE films.
(1) Based on tests conducted by the Fraunhofer Center for Silicon Photovoltaics CSP. Chart provided by Fraunhofer. Additional information is available upon request.
(2) Based on Dow testing that compared a module film made with ENGAGE™ PV POE to a module made with an EVA-based film. Additional information is available upon request.
Resources
Optimized module performance combined with lower system costs – ENGAGE™ PV Polyolefin Elastomers for photovoltaic encapsulant films.
Designed specifically for photovoltaic encapsulant films, ENGAGE™ PV Polyolefin Elastomers delivers reliable and low-cost solar energy.
Received Edison Award for breakthrough technology, delivering optimized performance and reduced lifetime costs of PV module systems.
Speak with Dow about ENGAGE™ PV POEs for solar cell encapsulants.