Abstract
Recently, photovoltaic systems have been devolved into much larger systems up to MW-scale. Photovoltaic industry participants give their focus on power generation capability of photovoltaic modules because their benefits can be decided from the amount of generation. The information on long-term performance change of photovoltaic modules helps to estimate the amount of power generation and evaluate the economic cost-benefits. Long-term performance of a PV system has been analyzed with operation data for 12 years from 1999 to 2010. In the first year, the amount of yearly power generation was 57.7 MWh with 13.2% capacity factor. In 2007, the amount of yearly generation was 44.3 MWh with 10.14% capacity factor, and in 2010, the amount was decreased down to 38.1 MWh with 8.7% capacity factor. The result means that long-term capacity factor has been 4.5% decreased for 12 years and that the amount of generation has been decreased 34.0% for 12 years which is 2.8 % per year. The latter capacity factor has been decreased faster than 0.20%, the average rate for 10 years. The performance decrease of the PV system is meant to be accelerated. The decrease of performance and utilization is due to aged deterioration of photovoltaic modules and lowering conversion efficiency of PCS.