choosing solar panels - newbie question

[Ed Bickford]

I am planning a solar electrical installation for Saltspring Island, BC. (possibly Solar Array: 1.4 kW at 48 V but not sure just yet) There will be lots of cloudy or partially cloudy days throughout the year. I have virtually unlimited space for panels (ground mounted) so watts per panel area isn't an issue. The site has great unobstructed southern exposure. My main concern is to select panels which will perform well in cloudy or partly cloudy conditions and be of good quality (which to me means reliable and durable) I plan to use a MPPT charge controller (maybe Xantex XW).

I am getting confused reading in some places that thin film (amorphous) panels would be potentially good for my application whereas other sites say they should be avoided at all costs.

Any advice on the type of panels that would best suit my needs or suggestions on where I might find helpful reading material would be very much appreciated.

Thanks in advance!
Ed

[Roy Shi]

It's new and should very few if not none here has experience with it.
Most of us only familiar with regular panels for good sunshine condition.
However, for the energy level of scattered sunlight is much much weeker than regular, you should be well prepared to collect only limited power.

[Rob Beckers]

Ed, I've not heard that thin-film has any advantage over regular silicon when it comes to lower light levels. Thin-film does have an edge in very warm climates; it has about half the temperature coefficient (and therefore power degradation) of regular silicon. That should not matter for your site though. The down side for thin-film is that you need twice the surface area for the same Wattage.

You can compare panels under low light by looking at the spec sheets for various brands: They usually have a graph with current curves at various light levels. See which ones work best (though I suspect there's little difference between brands when it comes to low light performance, performance seems to be linear with light intensity).

-RoB-

[Penny Walters]

How many sun hours should you have to makes it work?