Available online at www.sciencedirect.

com

Solar Energy 83 (2009) 14341445

www.elsevier.com/locate/solener

Life cycle assessment study of a 4.2 kWp stand-alone

photovoltaic system
R. Garca-Valverde a,*,1, C. Miguel a, R. Martnez-Bejar b, A. Urbina a
a

Universidad Politecnica de Cartagena, Departamento de Electronica, Tecnologa de Computadoras y Proyectos,

Campus Muralla del Mar, 30203, Cartagena, Murcia, Spain
b
Universidad de Murcia, Departamento de Ingeniera de la Informacion y las Comunicaciones, Facultad de Informatica,
Campus de Espinardo, 30071, Murcia, Spain
Received 27 February 2008; received in revised form 24 February 2009; accepted 4 March 2009
Available online 3 April 2009
Communicated by: Associate Editor S.C. Bhattacharya

Abstract
The energetic and environmental life cycle assessment of a 4.2 kWp stand-alone photovoltaic system (SAPV) at the University of Murcia (south-east of Spain) is presented. PV modules and batteries are the energetically and environmentally most expensive elements. The
energy pay-back time was found to be 9.08 years and the specic CO2 emissions was calculated as 131 g/kWh. The SAPV system has
been environmentally compared with other supply options (diesel generator and Spanish grid) showing lower impacts in both cases.
The results show the CO2-emission reduction potential of SAPV systems in southern European countries and point out the critical environmental issues in these systems.
2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Life cycle assessment; Stand-alone photovoltaic system; Energy pay-back time; CO2 emission factor

1. Introduction
Power generation from photovoltaic (PV) systems is free
from fossil fuel use and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
However a considerable amount of energy is consumed in
the manufacturing and transport of the elements of the system, also the amount of energy and emissions from a
decommissioning phase of the system must be taken into
account.
Life cycle assessment (LCA) studies aim at comparing
and analysing the environmental impacts of products and
services. In solar PV systems these studies present the
energy use in terms of energy pay-back time (EPBT), which
is the time required for the solar PV system to generate the
*

Corresponding author.
E-mail address: rafael.gvalverde@upct.es (R. Garca-Valverde).
1
Supported by the Spanish Ministry for Science and Education through
the fellowship AP2005-2271.
0038-092X/$ - see front matter 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.solener.2009.03.012

equivalent amount of energy consumed in the construction

and decommissioning phases. In PV grid-connected systems the EPBT must be compared with the competing
energy sources in order to justify its use as primary energy
source. Numerous LCA studies have been carried out over
PV grid-connected systems (Alsema, 2000a; Jungbluth,
2005; Kato et al., 1997; Kannan et al., 2006; Muneer
et al., 2006; Knapp and Jester, 2001). A wide variation in
the EPBT is found in these studies. Energy consumption
during manufacturing solar PV modules does not vary signicantly with geographical location. Nevertheless, the
amount of electricity generated from a solar PV system
depends on its geographical location, e.g. solar irradiation
and temperature. Transport of components during construction and decommissioning phases depends on the site
as well.
Stand-alone photovoltaic (SAPV) systems will hold an
important share in the deployment of new photovoltaic
systems, specially in developing countries, where there are

R. Garca-Valverde et al. / Solar Energy 83 (2009) 14341445

still large rural areas without electrication of any kind,

much less with an available electrical grid. Much of the
future electrication projects will be funded by public
investment, publicprivate partnership or non-governmental organizations, which have great concern about sustainable development and therefore the environmental impact
of any project has to be carefully assessed. Nevertheless,
few LCA studies can be found in the literature and they
are usually restricted to Solar Home Systems (Alsema,
2000b) or hybrid systems (Watt et al., 1998). SAPV systems
hardly have to justify its primary energy use since they are
usually located in places where there is not competing
energy source (e.g. remote areas, rural homes in developing
countries, etc.). However a LCA study can be very useful to
keep track of the dierent system components and to identify the energetically and environmentally most expensive
steps and elements.
SAPV system design is very dependent on the geographical location of the system since the amount of electricity
generated varies with the irradiance and temperature but
also with the consumed energy. In general SAPV systems
are designed according to a specic load pattern and they
have an energy storage system to feed the load during the
low or no solar irradiance periods. Therefore it is possible
to nd sunny periods where the energy source is available
but there is no load, the energy storage is full and part of
the available PV energy is not used.
In this article a LCA study has been carried out for a
4.2 kWp stand-alone solar PV system, which has been operating in Murcia (south-east of Spain) since March 2003. A
description of the facility and the monitoring system is presented in Section 2. The LCA study is developed in Section
3, including the material inventory and the summary of the
energy use and GHG emissions during the life cycle of the
facility. Then the EPBT, the CO2 emission factor and the
CO2 pay-back time (CO2PBT) are worked out using data
from the facility. Finally, in Section 4 the conclusions from
the study are presented.
2. Description of the SAPV system
The SAPV system at the University of Murcia Espinardo Campus (38 north, 1 west), sited 5 km from Murcias city centre was set up in March, 2003. It feeds part of
the lighting system of the Animal Service Laboratory and
was built as a contribution to the Spanish Plan for the Promotion of Renewable Energies. The size and design of the
facility are similar to a typical SAPV system for rural electrication (isolated dwellings in developed countries or
schools, health centres and small farms in developing ones),
allowing us to perform experimental research useful for
small community services electrication studies.
The 4.2 kWp SAPV system consists of 40 mono-crystalline silicon modules (24 V, 106 Wp) mounted on a building
rooftop with galvanized steel supporting structures. The
PV generator covers a total nominal area of 35 m2 and it
is 30 tilted over the horizontal maximizing the average

1435

annual production and 20 east oriented from the pure

south in order to get a better building integration. Fig. 1
presents a picture of the facility under discussion. The PV
Generator is connected to two charge regulators which
control the charge of a bank of batteries from the PV generator. The bank of batteries is made up of 24 open leadacid batteries connected in series (2300Ah@C100) oering
48 V of nominal voltage and 3 days of autonomy and it is
connected to an inverter of 3kVA of capacity which feed
the AC loads. Table 1 includes the technical specications
of the components and Fig. 2 shows the circuit diagram of
the facility. The SAPV supplies a programmed lighting system, because of that the load pattern is daily constant, with
13.776 kWh/day.
A monitoring system was installed to record electrical
(DC generated power, current and voltage, state of charge
of the bank of batteries and AC consumed power) and
meteorological data (global and diuse horizontal radiation, global tilted radiation and cell and ambient temperatures). The measured data are recorded each 5 min and
stored in a data base. A web-site has also been developed
to present the behaviour of the facility and the research
projects carried on using the system as an experimental
proof bench (UMU-UPCT, 2007). The web allows the public to follow its performance on-line. Figs. 3 and 4 show
respectively the solar radiation behaviour and the energetic
balance of the University of Murcia facility for a typical
day on a 5 min averaged-data basis.
3. Life cycle assessment
A LCA was performed to quantify the energy use and
GHG emissions from electricity generation from a solar
SAPV system. We assumed a life time of 20 years for the
PV facility. However, PV modules are expected to have
longer life-times according to the manufacturer guarantee.
A life cycle assessment usually includes a life cycle cost
analysis. Since this study is focused on environmental
aspects, we only present the life cycle energy and GHG
emission analysis. Spain does not have yet extensive lifecycle databases available for general use. Consequently,
although some Spanish data are available on energy
sources, much of the data used in this study were based
on analyses undertaken in other countries. The life cycle
of a solar PV system is considered to be comprised of three
phases, namely construction, operation and decommissioning. The followed methodology can be summarised in the
next steps:
(1) Denition of the system boundary. It establishes the
scope of the analysis: indicates which production processes are taken into account and those that are not.
Fig. 5 shows the LCA boundary for a typical SAPV
System.
(2) Compilation of the material inventory for the total
PV system life. If it exits, the ratio between recycled
and virgin material must be considered, since their

R. Garca-Valverde et al. / Solar Energy 83 (2009) 14341445

1436

Fig. 1. 4.2 kWp photovoltaic generator mounted on the building rooftop.

Table 1
Technical specications of the PV system.
Manufacturer

ISOFOTON

PV module
Nominal power (W)
Open circuit voltage (V)
Short circuit current (A)
Max. power voltage (V)
Max. power current (A)
Mass (kg)
Length (cm)
Width (cm)

106
43.2
3.27
34.8
3.05
11.5
131.0
65.4

Inverter
Model
Nominal input voltage (V)
Input voltage range (V)
Nominal output power (kVA)
Nominal output voltage (V)
Frequency output (Hz)
Eciency

ISOVERTER 3000/48
48
4064
3.0
220
50 1%
8595%

a
b
c

Manufacturer

ISOFOTON

Charge regulators
Model
Nominal Voltage (V)
Maximum Currenta (A)
Consumption disconnection (V)
Generation disconnection (V)

ISOTEL 40SD
48
30  4
<44.8
>62.4

Bank of batteries
Type
Nominal voltageb (V)
Capacityc (Ah)
Capacity (kWh)
Minimum SOC

Open lead-acid
2  24
2300
110.4
70%

Two charge regulators with two DC inputs each one.

24 series connected batteries.
During 100 h of discharge.

embodied energy dier strongly. Also the life time of

the system must be previously dened in order to take
into account input of materials due to replacements.
In some cases the functional unit (usually kg) can
be substituted for another more suitable for posterior
calculation (e.g. m2 for PV modules).
(3) Compilation of the Life Cycle Energy use. It is an
inventory of the energy inputs for each process during the three phases of the PV system life. The energy
requirements should be considered initially as thermal and electrical energy forms separately and then
converted to Equivalent Primary Energy using specied conversion eciencies. These energy requirements are calculated separately for each component
setting a value of embodied energy per functional unit
(e.g. kWhth/kg). Finally the total embodied energy is
solved according to these values and the created
material inventory.

(4) Compilation of the Life Cycle GHG Emissions use.

The GHG emission levels for each energy input must
be dened. In order to calculate the electricity inputs,
a fuel mix must be adopted (according to the specic
location where the system is operating). In this study
the emissions are presented as embodied emissions
for each component of the PV systems.
(5) Estimation of the energy generation by the PV system. It is usually approximated from the estimated
life time and the denition of a typical irradiance
and performance ratio for the system. In this study
we have measured the supplied AC electricity to the
load from the PV system.
(6) Calculation of environmental factors or indicators.
We will use the EPBT and the equivalent CO2 emission factor. Analysis of other impacts, like emissions
to water, to soil or risk to human health is beyond of
the scope of this study.

R. Garca-Valverde et al. / Solar Energy 83 (2009) 14341445

1437

Fig. 2. Circuit diagram of the PV facility.

1200

36
Horizontal Global Rad.
Horizontal Diffuse Rad.

1000

Tilted Global Rad.

30

800

24

600

18

400

12

200

0
00:03

Ambient Temperature [C]

Solar radiation [W/m ]

Ambient Temp.

0
02:08 04:13

06:18

08:23

10:28 12:33

14:38

16:43

18:48 20:53

22:58

Local Time [hh:mm]

Fig. 3. Plot of solar radiation measured data during April 1st 2008.

3.1. Material inventory

Unlike other energy sources, PV solar systems hardly
involve any material inow during the operation and
decommissioning phases. Only in the construction phase
material inow is involved. PV modules and batteries are
the heaviest components. Since some recycling networks
are already working in Spain, therefore part of the material

inow in some components comes from recycled material.These percentages are detailed below. A list of materials that were used in constructing the given PV facility is
provided in Table 2 and plotted in Fig. 6.
In SAPV systems the battery life time is a limiting factor. The lead-acid batteries life time in a SAPV facility
depends strongly on the level of use (autonomy, charge-discharge rates and protections from the charge regulator)

R. Garca-Valverde et al. / Solar Energy 83 (2009) 14341445

1438
4000

105

3000

100

2500

95

2000

90

1500

85

1000

80

500

75

0
00:03 02:08

Batteries SOC [%]

Power [W]

3500

110

PV Power
Load Power
SOC

70
04:13

06:18 08:23

10:28 12:33

14:38 16:43

18:48

20:53 22:58

Local Time [hh:mm]

Fig. 4. Generated, consumed power and state of charge (SOC) of the batteries measured at the facility during April 1st 2008.

and the maintenance of them (mainly relling of distilled

water and ph control). In this case, the batteries at the facility are specic for PV uses and the charge regulators implement dierent functions (equalization charge, oating
charge and protection under deep discharges) to protect
them and to maximize their life time. The long period of
autonomy (3 days) and the low levels of load let us to take
as optimistic assumption a life time of 10 years for them
(the supplier guarantee is 810 years (ISOFOTON,
2006)), so we include a double amount of batteries in the
construction phase. However, it is known that in developing countries many SAPV systems are implemented with
batteries of lower quality and with more stressful discharging cycles, which should be taken into account in the considered life time.
3.2. Life cycle energy use
All the manufacturing, assembly, transportation, installation and recycling of the PV modules and balance-of-system (BOS) such as inverters, charge regulators and
batteries, supporting structures and their accessories consume energy, which is referred to as embodied energy.
LCA studies for photovoltaics show a high variation in
results and conclusions. Critical issues during modelling of
a life cycle inventory (LCI) are: few data availability (few
producers provide reliable and veriable data), power
mixes assumed for the material production processes and
process-specic emissions. Moreover, a LCA study for
each material should be a site-specic study. This presents
some diculties in photovoltaics since the construction
process of some components may have been carried out

in dierent steps and/or dierent countries having dierent

energetic conditions.
In the following section, a life cycle energy analysis for
the University of Murcia PV installation is performed.
Note that embodied energies are expressed in form of primary energy (MWhth), since most of the energy inputs
are in the form of process (lower-grade) thermal energy.
For the sake of clarity, all electrical inputs are converted
into primary energy requirements, with an assumed best
thermoelectric conversion eciency of 35%.2

3.2.1. Construction phase

3.2.1.1. PV modules. Numerous studies have been carried
out to estimate the energy consumption in the manufacturing of mono-crystalline solar PV modules (Alsema, 2000a;
Jungbluth, 2005; Kato et al., 1997; Knapp and Jester, 2001;
Krauter and Ruther, 2004; Karl and Theresa, 2002). It can
be seen that the energy consumption for manufacturing of
solar PV modules varied between 11 and 18 MWhth/kWp.
The variations can be attributed to technological assumptions and system boundary. Table 3 summarises the most
recent life cycle energy values for mono-crystalline solar
PV modules.
In this study we chose the data proposed by Alsema
(2000a), where he published a review of previous works
and he made an estimation of the embodied energy of a
medium size PV eld similar to our PV facility. He estimated energy requirements for mono-crystalline (mc) sili2
Then, 1 MJ (1/3.6 kWhth) of primary energy can supply 0.097 kWh of
electrical energy.

R. Garca-Valverde et al. / Solar Energy 83 (2009) 14341445

1439

Fig. 5. LCA boundary for a typical SAPV system.

Table 2
Material use in the SAPV system.
Element

Materials

Mass
(kg)

40  106 Wp PV module

Mono-crystalline silicon,
aluminiun, EVA, TEDLAR
Mixed
Mixed
Lead, lead oxide, lead sulphate,
etc.
Galvanized steel
Copper

460

2  Charge regulators
1  Inverter
24  2 V Lead-acid batteries
(2300Ah@C100)
Supporting structure
Cables

5
25
2412a,b
562
44

a
Excluding the weight of the electrolyte according to the estimation in
Rydh and Sanden (2005a).
b
Double amount of batteries.

con module (frameless) production in 5700 MJ/m2 equivalent to 1.583 MWhth/m2 (13.19 MWth/kWp).
Ten per cent of the module weight is considered as the
aluminium frame. Recycling rates for aluminium for building and transport applications range from 6090 per cent in

European countries (IAI, 2003). A realistic scenario of a

recycled aluminium content of 35% (IAI, 2003) is assumed
for Spain.
3.2.1.2. BOS components. There are few available data
about energy requirements for charge regulators and
inverters manufacturing, specially for small and medium
size facilities. Kato et al. (1997) estimated a 0.5 MWhth
for energy requirements for the inverters in a 3 kW residential PV system (0.17 MWhth/kWp). More recently, Alsema
(2000a) and Rydh and Sanden (2005a) used values of
1 MJ/Wel (0.277 MWhth/kWel) for inverters as well as for
charge regulators, estimated over the size of the electronic
devices, not over the size of the facility.
For battery energy requirements Rydh and Sanden
(2005a,b) made a complete review of the dierent technologies. There is a lead-acid batteries recycling network in
Europe to collect used batteries and rene them. This network is one of the most ecient recycling systems. The
European collect level is about 85% and the lead recycling

R. Garca-Valverde et al. / Solar Energy 83 (2009) 14341445

1440

4.2 kWp stand-alone PV system material inventory

6000
5000

4824

kg

4000
3000
2000
1000

562

400
60

44

25

Module
frames

Cables

Inverter

Charge
regulators

0
24V Lead- Supporting
acid battery structure

PV
modules
(frameless)

Fig. 6. Material use in the SAPV system.

Table 3
Life cycle energy use for mono-crystalline solar PV modules.
Source

Primary energy in usea

Included processes in the study

Jungbluth et al. (2005)

Knapp and Jester (2001)
Krauter and Ruther (2004)

12.50 MWhth/kWp
16.00 MWhth/kWp
16.08 MWhth/kWp

Alsema (2000a)

13.19 MWhth/kWp

From silica sand to PV module (frameless)

From growth of the silicon crystalline ingot to module fabrication
PV module production, including the
demand for building the production facilities
From silica sand to PV module (frameless)

Conversions to module rated peak power (kWp) basis are easily computed from module area and power rating from the manufacturer datasheets.

level is about 97% (Lailler, 2003).The level of recycling of

lead-acid batteries in Spain is estimated about 9597%
(AIIM, 2002). However, in a more realistic hypothesis,
we considered that only 50% of the lead-acid batteries for
our facility came from recycled materials.
The PV modules are installed over a galvanized steel supporting structure. For the supporting structure and cables,
the energy use is estimated based on their specic energy
consumptions (Hammond and Jones, 2006). We consider
that 90% of the steel (usual rate in Europe for transport
and building applications (ASSURRE, 2003)) and 43% of
the copper come from recycled materials (ECI, 2006).
Table 4 summarises the values used in this study for the
energy requirement per unit in the production of each component. Note that when a recycling network for the component exists part of the energy requirement is reduced since
generally production from recycled material is energetically
less expensive.
According to the values shown in Table 4, the energy
requirement for the production of all the elements of the
given PV facility sums 124.81 MWhth. Fig. 7 shows the
energy requirement for each element in the facility.
3.2.1.3. Transport. An extra energy requirement in the construction phase is the energy used in transporting the dier-

Table 4
Energy requirements for production of the SAPV system.
Element

New materials and

manufacturing

Reclycled materials
and manufacturing

mc-Si PV modulea,b
Al module framec
Charge regulatord
Inverterb,d
Lead-acid batteryd
Steel galvanizede
Cablese

1.583 MWhth/m2
41.7 kWhth/kg
277 kWhth/kWel
277 kWhth/kWel
331 kWhth/kWh
9.72 kWhth/kg
19.44 kWhth/kg

2.08 kWhth/kg

242 kWhth/kWh
2.5 kWhth/kg
13.9 kWhth/kg

a
b
c
d
e

Frameless.
Alsema (2000a).
IAI (2003).
Rydh and Sanden (2005a).
Hammond and Jones (2006).

ent elements to the installation site. Energy used in

transporting all the materials associated with the solar
PV system is estimated according to specic transportation
energy (MJ/t-km) assumptions extracted from EEA (2003)
(0.41 MJ/t-km by heavy truck). PV modules, inverter,
charge regulators and batteries were made in the ISOFOTON (2008) factory (Malaga, Spain), which is located
370 km from the facility. For the supporting structure
and cables, local suppliers, located at 50 km of distance

R. Garca-Valverde et al. / Solar Energy 83 (2009) 14341445

1441

Production Embodied energy

70.00

63.17

60.00

55.42

MWh th

50.00
40.00
30.00
20.00
10.00
1.81

1.67

1.16

0.83

0.75

Supporting
structure

Al frames

Charge
regulators

Inverter

Cables

0.00
Lead-acid
batteries

PV
modules
(mc-Si)

Fig. 7. Energy requirements for the production of the PV facility.

approximately, were employed. Notice that we assume that

all BOS components energy inputs were taking place at the
respective suppliers sites. Therefore, transport from raw
materials producers to suppliers is neglected.
The total embodied energy use in transporting for the
PV facility is 244 kWhth, which means only 0.20% of the
total embodied energy for the facility in the construction
phase.
3.2.2. Operational phase
In the operational phase, there is no external source of
energy supply for PV modules, structures, cables and electronic devices. Although control systems are installed, they
draw energy from the solar PV module itself. The two
charge regulators maximum consumption accounts for
52.5 kWh/year, while the inverter maximum consumption
is 31.5 kWh/year. Since the SAPV facility has no mobile
parts and all the components except the batteries have long
term guarantees, the maintenance and repairing energy can
be neglected.
3.2.3. Decommissioning phase
3.2.3.1. Recycling processes. At the end of the life cycle, the
solar PV system generates a substantial amount of waste.
PV modules recycling could save two thirds of the necessary energy for wafer production (Muller et al., 2005)
and several research institutes and companies are working
on recycling concepts for thin lm modules and modules
with crystalline cells (Bombach et al., 2005). However,
the possibility of recycling not damaged wafers or glass
from PV modules does not exist in Spain for the moment.
Therefore, it is assumed that the solar PV modules would
be landlled after removing the aluminium frames. Ten
per cent of the module weight is considered as the aluminium frame (Kannan et al., 2006).
No recycling processes are considered for electronics
devices in the PV facility.

For simplicity, recycling processes for metals (aluminium, steel and copper) are considered to consume the same
energy as the energy requirements to produce and manufacture them from recycled material (values shown in Table
4).
Regarding recycling lead-acid batteries, the recycling
process is dierent from the production process using recycled materials. The value 0.688 kWhth of energy consumption per kg of recycled lead-acid batteries is assumed, in
accordance with Salomone (2005).
3.2.3.2. Transport to recycling plants. We assume batteries
and metals would be recycled in the closest local recycling
factories. In this sense, 50 km distance is assumed.
Table 5 shows the energy consumption in the decommissioning phase for the dierent elements in the given PV
facility.
3.3. Life cycle GHG emissions
The CO2 emissions due to the production of the PV system can be obtained by multiplying all energy and material
inputs by their corresponding emission factors.
Table 6 shows the CO2 emission factors used in the analysis. For PV modules, electronic devices and batteries proTable 5
Energy consumption in the decommission phase for the PV facility
(kWhth).
Element

Recycling process

Transport to
recycling plants

Total

PV frames
Supporting structure
Cables
Lead-acid batteries

125.00
1405.18
611.84
3316.77

0.60
5.62
0.44
48.24

125.60
1410.80
612.28
3365.01

Total

5458.79

54.90

5513.69

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1442

Table 6
Emission factors for the elements in the SAPV facility.
Element
a

Al frames
mc-Si PV modulesb
Charge regulatorsb
Inverterb
Lead-acid batteriesc
Supporting structured
Cablesd
a
b
c
d

Production from new materials

Production from recycled materials

Recycling process

14.6 kgCO2/kg
93.6 gCO2/kWhth
93.6 gCO2/kWhth
93.6 gCO2/kWhth
93.6 gCO2/kWhth
2.82 kgCO2/kg
5.57 kgCO2/kg

0.73 kgCO2/kg

93.6 gCO2/kWhth
0.45 kgCO2/kg
3.98 kgCO2/kg

0.73 kgCO2/kg

0.16 gCO2/kg
0.45 kgCO2/kg
3.98 kgCO2/kg

IAI (2003).
WWF/ADENA (2006).
Salomone (2005) and WWF/ADENA (2006).
Hammond and Jones (2006).

duction emission factor, we assume the fuel mix of Spain in

2006 (WWF/ADENA, 2006), where about 24.5% of the
electricity was produced by coal-plants, 23.5% by natural
gas plants, 22.3% by nuclear, 9.2% by hydro-electric plants,
8.5% by wind-farms, 2.2% by fuel plants and 9.9% by other
plants. For this electricity system, the CO2-emission factor
is 0.337 kg per kWh produced electricity (0.0936 kg/
kWhth). CH4, SO2 or NOX emissions are ignored due to
uncertainties in primary sources of energy use.
The transportation (from the factory to the facility and
to recycling plants) was done by heavy truck, the emission
value for this kind of transport per tone and km transported is 91 g of CO2 (EEA, 2003).
Finally, the total calculated embodied CO2 for the facility is about 13.17 metric tons. Table 7 shows the embodied
CO2 per element and per phase.
The distribution of the embodied CO2 is plotted in
Fig. 8. The total amount of CO2 emissions due to transport
is 219.72 kg which means 1.7% of the total CO2 emissions
for the facility. Embodied emissions for recycling sum
472.83 kg, 3.6% of the total. The rest of embodied emissions are due to the production of the elements, which
are shown separately.
3.4. EPBT analysis of the solar PV system
As result of the Life cycle energy use study a total
embodied energy of 130.55 MWhth is estimated for the
facility. Table 8 summarises the results of the analysis.
Fig. 9 shows the distribution of embodied energy at the
Table 7
Embodied CO2 for the PV facility at the University of Murcia (kg).
Element
Al frames
PV modules (mc-Si)
Charge regulators
Inverter
Lead-acid batteries
Supporting structure
Cables
Total

Construction
phase

Decommission
phase

Total

586.90
5202.07
109.09
78.69
6088.00
388.70
215.45

44.07

22.71
255.49
175.53

630.97
5202.07
109.09
78.69
6110.72
644.19
390.99

12,668.90

497.80

13,166.71

facility: recycling, transportation and production of each

element are shown separately.
The energy pay-back time (EPBT) is dened as the ratio
of embodied energy, converted to electrical energy, to the
annual electrical production.
EPBT

EEMB;th gthel
:
EUSE;el

Assuming a best thermoelectric eciency of gthel  35%,

the estimated embodied energy for the PV system is equivalent to 45.692 MWhel.
The PV facility at the University of Murcia supplies a
xed load, which follows a daily constant pattern. Thus,
the daily energy consumption is 13.776 kWh/day. This
means that the annual electrical production is
5028.24 kWhel/year. According to Eq. (1) an EPBT of the
9.08 years is obtained. Therefore, the PV facility will generate more than twice the energy embodied in it by the end of
its life-time (estimated in 20 years).
Table 9 shows the results for EPBT at the present study
and previous LCA studies of stand-alone PV systems. It
can be seen that the performance ratio (PR) in stand-alone
PV systems is usually lower than for grid-connected system. Most of the LCA studies predict a typical PR and
work out from it the yearly electricity withdrawn from
the PV system (EUSE in Eq. (2)). Thanks to the monitoring
system we could measure directly the generated electricity
per year (AC electricity supplied to the load) and work
out the mean PR for the facility.
EUSE PR

H i P STC
;
GSTC

where Hi is the yearly irradiation received by the PV generator, GSTC is the irradiance at standard conditions
(1000 W/m2) and PSTC is the nominal PV generator power
at the maximum power point at standard conditions.
3.5. CO2 emissions analysis
The environmental impacts of SAPV systems can only
be evaluated properly if we compare them to other supply
options. Avoided emissions depend on the alternative electricity supply which the PV facility is compared to. Two

R. Garca-Valverde et al. / Solar Energy 83 (2009) 14341445

1443

4.2 kWp stand-alone PV facility

Cables
1.63%

Recycling
3.59%

Transport
1.67%
Module frames
4.44%

Supporting
structure
2.93%

PV modules
(frameless)
39.40%

Lead-acid
batteries
44.91%

Inverter
0.59%

Charge
regulators
0.83%

Fig. 8. Distribution of embodied CO2 in the given PV facility.

Table 8
LCA for the PV installation: embodied energy.
Embodied energy (MWhth)

Element

Mass (kg)

PV modules (frameless)
Module frames
Charge regulators
Inverter
Lead-acid batteries
Supporting structure
Cables

400.00
60.00
5.00
25.00
4824.00
562.07
44.05

55.43
1.80
1.16
0.83
66.74
3.22
1.36

Total

5920.12

130.55

scenarios are used for this comparison. Firstly, the SAPV

facility would be placed in a remote area competing with
a diesel generator. Secondly, the SAPV facility would be
placed in a not isolated area competing directly with the
Spanish grid.
For a diesel generator the emission factor is considered
1.27 kg of CO2/kWhel (Alsema, 2000b).This value takes
into account emissions during fuel combustion, the fuel
extraction and rening, manufacturing of the generator
itself and fuel transport (over 100 km).

4.2 kWp stand-alone PV facility

Cables
0.58%
Supporting structure
1.40%

Recycling
2.10%

Transportation
0.11%
Module frames
0.34%

PV modules
(frameless)
21%

Lead-acid batteries
48.68%
Charge regulators
0.45%
Inverter
0.32%
Fig. 9. Distribution of life cycle energy use in the PV facility: embodied energy.

R. Garca-Valverde et al. / Solar Energy 83 (2009) 14341445

1444

Table 9
EPBT Comparison with other LCA studies of SAPV system.
Source

SAPV system Description

49 Wp Solar Home System in Indonesia Hi = 1533 kWh/m /year, PR = 0.6
12 kWp Residential SAPV System in Antalya (Turkey) Hi = 1733 kWh/m2/year, PR = 0.58
4.2 kWp SAPV System in Murcia (Spain) Hi = 1932 kWh/m2/year, PR = 0.62

Alsema (2000b)
Celik et al. (2008)
Present studya
a

EPBT (years)
2

10.11
6.29.6
9.08

The irradiance and the PR have been estimated from almost 2 years of measured data at the facility each 5 min.

For the second scenario, a level of generated emissions

by the Spanish grid of 0.337 kgCO2/kWhel is assumed for
the fuel mix in 2006 as mentioned in Section 3.3.
The amount of 13,166 kg of embodied CO2 for the given
SAPV facility has been calculated in the life cycle GHG
emissions study. The electricity generated annually by the
facility (5028.24 kWhel/year) means 100,564.8 kWhel of
generated electricity during 20 years (estimated life time).
Therefore, for this facility the CO2-emission factor is about
0.131 kg/kWh. In Fig. 10, all the emission factor for a diesel generator, the Spanish grid, the facility at the University
of Murcia and a Solar Home System (SHS) in Indonesia
(4.2 kWh/m2/day) with an average performance ratio of
0.6 (Alsema, 2000b) are depicted.
Finally, by proceeding similarly to the way EPBT is estimated, we obtain a CO2 pay-back time (CO2PBT) as the
ratio of the total embodied CO2 in the facility, to the total
avoided CO2 emissions. Thus, for the CO2 emission
avoided when compared to Spanish grid an CO2PBT of
7.77 years is obtained, while for the diesel generator comparison only 2.06 years would be needed.
4. Conclusions
A 4.2 kWp SAPV installation at the University of
Murcia (Spain) has been described. The daily constant
load pattern allows us to work out the annual energy
consumption as 5028.24 kWhel/year. On the basis of

the LCA, it was found that the facility has about

45.692 MWhel of embodied energy and 13.166 metric
tons of embodied CO2. As it was expected, the biggest
energy requirements and emissions are in the construction phase.
PV modules and batteries are the energetically and environmentally most expensive elements. Mono-crystalline silicon PV modules production involves the highest energy
requirements. Open lead-acid batteries must be replaced
after 10 years (maximum life-time) and it makes them the
component with major embodied energy and emissions.
The fuel mix of the electricity production processes
strongly determines the results of PV power system LCAs.
The Spanish fuel mix (2006) contains 18% of energy from
renewable energies (including hydro-electric plants) which
lead to lower levels of emissions in the construction phase.
Transportation only accounts for 0.11% and 1.7% of the
total embodied energy and embodied CO2, respectively. Producers and recycling plants are all national, so they are
close to the facility. These low values would be dicult
to keep in developing countries if they have to import
SAPV system components. Recycling accounts for 2.1%
and 3.67% of the total embodied energy and the embodied
CO2 respectively, but only batteries, PV modules frames,
supporting structure and cables can be recycled for the
moment in Spain. Therefore, 430 kg of waste from PV
modules and electronic devices must be landlled at the
decommissioning phase.

CO2 emission of supply options

1400

1270

1200

g/kWh

1000
800

600

600

337

400

131

200
0
Diesel Generator

SHS (Indonesia,
2000)

Spanish Grid (2006)

SAPV University of
Murcia

Fig. 10. CO2 emission per kWh of supplied electricity (assuming a 20-year life time) for dierent supply options.

R. Garca-Valverde et al. / Solar Energy 83 (2009) 14341445

The current facility is forecasted to payback its embodied energy in about 9.08 years since its installation (March,
2003). The emission factor for the facility is 131 g of CO2
per kWh for an estimated life-time of 20 years. This value
is much lower than other possible supply options (diesel
generator and Spanish grid) and shows the great environmental potential of photovoltaics in the south-east of
Spain.
Acknowledgement
This work has been possible thanks to the project HOPE
CSD2007-00007 (Consolider-Ingenio 2010).
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