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The increasing awareness of the problem of climate change is raising the level of general interest in regenerative energy sources. Along with wind energy, photovoltaics in particular has in recent years received an enormous boost and is being used in solar power stations and in many new buildings.

With the increasing use of photovoltaics and its incorporation in existing structures and technologies for energy supply and distribution, there is a growing need for general standards and specifications for photovoltaic components and systems.

The standards are elaborated principally by TC 82 "Solar Photovoltaic Energy Systems" of the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), and adopted by TC 82 "Solar Photovoltaic Energy Systems" of the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC) as a European standard. The German Commission for Electrical, Electronic & Information Technologies of DIN and VDE (DKE) incorporates them into the collection of German Standards.

In the DKE, committee K 373 "Solar Photovoltaic Energy Systems" is responsible for publishing European standards in the German collection of standards, and for preparing standards with provisions for photovoltaic (PV) power generation systems, both autonomous (stand-alone systems) and grid connected terrestrial solar photovoltaic energy systems.

The ongoing standardization project of committee K 373 "Solar Photovoltaic Energy Systems" is:

• standard for photovoltaic in buildings.

The following standardization project is planned (under consideration):

• guideline for the design of PV-Systems.

Standards Developed Specially for PV Applications:

There are standards for the following areas:

• measuring procedures,
• general requirements for PV-Systems,
• requirements for PV-Modules and parts of PV-Modules,
• requirements for PV-Inverters and for the grid connection,
• requirements for components of the PV-System.

A detailed list of the standards and drafts is to be found in the enclosed download file "List of standards, drafts and specifications specially developed for PV applications".

Specifications Specially Developed for PV Applications:

These specifications are published by the Quality Assessment system for Electronic Components, IECQ. The blank detail specifications are used to prepare detail specifications for photovoltaic modules using thin film technology and with crystalline silicon cells, for charge regulators and stand-alone systems, which can be used both by standards organizations and by user groups and manufacturers.

The detail specifications are divided into two parts. The first part is the data sheet containing all the main electrical and mechanical data. The second part describes the test programme that the manufacturer regularly carries out to guarantee the characteristics warranted in the data sheet. The detail specifications also form the basis for certification under the IECQ quality assessment system.

A detailed list of specifications is included in the enclosed download file "List of standards, drafts and specifications specially developed for PV applications".

Further information on these specifications and their application are given in the publication "Qualitätsstandards und Prüfprogramme" ("Quality standards and test programmes", only available in German).