A Letter From Our CEO (2024)
As RETC publishes its sixth annual PV Module Index Report, our organization has never been better positioned to support the global energy transition.
As a member of the VDE Group, RETC provides customers worldwide with a one-stop shop for solar and energy storage product testing, inspection, and certification. Moreover, RETC is uniquely positioned to support the nascent US clean energy manufacturing renaissance.
Since the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, companies have announced nearly $17 billion worth of investments in new and expanded solar manufacturing capacity additions in the United States. Given the unprecedented market expansion in the world’s second-largest solar market, industry stakeholders must remain vigilant regarding technical risks inherent to supply chain diversification and the accelerated time frames between innovation and mass production.
To better meet the needs of an expanding US clean energy manufacturing ecosystem, RETC recently acquired SolarPTL, a photovoltaic testing laboratory based in Tempe, Arizona, with a dedicated outdoor testing facility. This acquisition does more than simply improve RETC’s overall solar, energy storage, and tracker testing throughput capabilities. It also provides manufacturing companies from Arizona to Texas with a regional partner for product testing and certification.
To better support product reliability testing and energy yield characterization, RETC has also expanded its outdoor testing and field forensics capabilities. We now operate a one-acre outdoor testing laboratory—formerly known as known as the Arizona Public Service (APS) Solar Test and Research (STAR) Center—specializing in reliability and performance characterization in hot, dry, high-irradiance conditions. We are also operating two newly acquired drone cameras with infrared capabilities and will soon be able to support customers with large-scale in-field electroluminescence (EL) testing.
As a highly accredited independent testing laboratory, RETC is privileged to receive a sneak preview of coming solar technologies and trends. Based on this perspective, we can confidently say that the future is largely a sunny and innovative place populated with new and exciting technologies. However, it is not a place without risk or cloudy weather. For example, RETC has long warned industry stakeholders about potential field durability risks intrinsic to ultra-large-format PV modules.
In our laboratory testing, RETC has consistently observed that heat-strengthened solar glass is more prone to breakage than fully tempered solar glass. Unfortunately, we now suspect this vulnerability may also apply to field deployments. We have therefore dedicated the entirety of the “Industry Trends” section of this year’s report to subject matter expert interviews exploring reports of spontaneous glass breakage and catastrophic hail losses in fielded solar assets. Our hope is that this candid discussion will inspire a collective response that ultimately eradicates the problem.
RETC is united with its customers in the belief that our collective work enables a safer and more sustainable future. Thank you for being our partners and collaborators in this endeavor.
