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http://dx.doi.org/10.5762/KAIS.2016.17.12.737

Study on crystallization behavior of an ethylene-polypropylene copolymer based encapsulant for photovoltaic application  

Son, Younggon (Division of Advanced Materials Science & Engineering, Kongiu National Univ.)
Publication Information
Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society / v.17, no.12, 2016 , pp. 737-742 More about this Journal
Abstract
We prepared five different ethylene-propylene copolymers (EPCs) for use as the encapsulant of a photovoltaic module. All of the polymers were of commercial grade from ExxonMobile company and had different ethylene/propylene compositions. The crystallization behaviors and crystal structures of the polymers were analyzed by differential scanning calorimetry and wide angle X-ray scattering diffractometry, respectively. We observed the general trend that the degree of crystallization, density and glass transition temperature of the EPCs decreased with increasing ethylene content. However, an unexpected result was also observed: the EPC with the highest ethylene content (22.2 mol. %) showed the highest melting temperature. As a result, the EPC with 22.2 mol. % of ethylene shows the highest light transmittance, due to its having the lowest degree of crystallization and highest thermal creep resistance. This abnormal result is attributed to the blocky structure prepared by ExxonMobile's special catalyst technology. It was also observed that new additional melting peaks appeared as the crystallization time increased. Using wide angle X-ray scattering diffractometry, it was confirmed that these additional peaks originated from the formation of a new crystal structure caused by annealing.
Keywords
crystallization; differential scarming calorimetry; encapsulant; ethylene-propylene copolymer; photovoltaic cell;
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Times Cited By KSCI : 1  (Citation Analysis)
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