JA Solar Panels Review
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JA Solar Panels Overview
JA Solar is a massive, well-established company that manufactures reliable, cost-effective solar panels for a range of applications, including residential, commercial and utility-scale systems. The company is not known for producing the most efficient panels but tends to focus on incorporating proven solar cell technologies to deliver reliable and affordable panels backed by a respectable 12 to 15-year product warranty. The next-generation JA Solar Deep Blue 4.0 series arriving in late 2022 will offer increased performance with efficiency up to an impressive 22.4%
JA Solar Panels Quick Summary
Power ratings (Watts): 330W - 545W
Panel Efficiency %: High - 19.6% - 21.5%
Cell technology: P-type PERC & N-type TOPCon
Price bracket: Low-med $$$
Most popular panel: Deep Blue 3.0 400W
Product Warranty: Good - 12 to 15 years
Service and support: Very good 4/5
Overall: Recommended ☆☆☆☆☆
Company History
Founded in 2005, JA Solar is one of the world's top 5 solar panel manufacturers in volume with over 12GW of panels shipped in 2021. The majority of manufacturing is located in China, with additional facilities in Vietnam and Malaysia. JA Solar is a massive vertically integrated Chinese based company producing wafers, cells and panels which are available in 135 countries and regions. The company offers a range of panels for residential, commercial and utility-scale systems. In regards to performance and efficiency, JA Solar has not typically been at the leading edge of innovation and has generally stuck with the tried and proven cell technologies that offer good performance and reliability. Based on our experience and feedback from industry professionals, this more conservative approach seems to have paid off with very few known quality issues detected on JA panels.
JA Solar is ranked as one of the top Tier 1 solar panel manufacturers by Bloomberg New Energy Finance. Although, it should be noted that the Tier 1 ranking is more a measure of a company’s financial stability, rather than a representation of quality and performance.
Range of Solar Panels
JA Solar manufactures a wide range of panels for residential, commercial and utility-scale systems. The currently available Deep Blue 3.0 series were the first panel from JA to be built using P-type PERC cells in the larger 182mm format, incorporating many of the latest cell technologies, including multi-busbars in a high-density half-cell format. The next generation Deep Blue 4.0X series, due in late 2022, will utilise cells made using the higher performance N-type silicon substrate described below.
Deep Blue 3.0 - Current range using P-type PERC cells
Deep Blue 3.0 Light - Compact residential series up to 420W
Deep Blue 3.0 Pro - High power commercial series up to 605W
Deep Blue 4.0 X - Next generation N-Type panels coming late 2022
Deep Blue 3.0 series
The Deep Blue 3.0 range is the latest generation of panels from JA Solar. First launched in mid-2020 and built using the 182mm P-type PERC cells, the Deep Blue series offers a good combination of performance and reliability backed by a respectable 12-year product warranty and extended 30-year performance warranty.
Gallium PERC cells
The third generation Deep Blue 3.0 series incorporates more advanced 182mm Gallium-doped silicon wafers. Traditional P-type cells are doped with Boron which can suffer from up to 3% degradation in the first year of use and up to 0.7% per year after. In comparison, Gallium-doped silicon reduces the degradation rate to 2% in the first year and 0.5% per year after. The use of Gallium doping has been proven to improve performance and reliability by lowering the rate of light-induced degradation, commonly known as LID.
Large 78 cell panels
Over recent years JA Solar appeared to become more successful in the larger utility-scale segment and was not competing heavily in the highly competitive residential rooftop solar industry. The push toward larger panels led to the development of higher wattage modules rated up to an impressive 605W using a larger 78-cell format (156 half-cut cells) in the roll-out of the Deep Blue 3.0 series.
Download the full JA Solar Deep Blue 3.0 78-cell specification datasheet
Deep Blue 3.0 Light
To extend the Deep Blue range, JA introduced the smaller format ‘Deep Blue 3.0 light’ modules tailored for residential and smaller commercial rooftops. These compact, lightweight panels offer high efficiency in a smaller package which is better suited to rooftop installations. The Deep Blue light series are available in 54 (108) and 60 (120) cell options and range from 340W to 420W with a maximum efficiency of 21.3%.
Download the full JA Solar Deep Blue 3.0 light specification datasheet
Deep Blue 4.0X Series
Coming late 2022
The next generation Deep Blue 4.0X series, expected to be released sometime in late 2022, will utilise cells made using high-performance N-type silicon substrate, as opposed to the P-type currently substrate used by most manufacturers. The new panels feature a wide range of new innovations, including what JA Solar refers to as BYCIUM+ cell technology which is a patented version of the TOPCon cell architecture. Other features include GFI technology which stands for Gapless Flexible Interconnection between cells, and 16 micro busbars, 6 more than the regular 10 busbar designs used by most other manufacturers. All these innovations boost peak panel efficiency up to an impressive 22.4%, along with a very good power temperature coefficient of only 0.30%.
The soon-to-be-released Deep Blue 4.0X series from JA Solar with up to 22.4% efficiency
Bifacial Solar panels
Bifacial solar panels are becoming increasingly popular on large-scale solar farms and commercial rooftops. Bifacial cells absorb light from both sides and in the right conditions can produce close to 30% more energy than traditional monofacial panels. JA Solar produces bifacial panels using a combination of PERC, half-cut and MBB, cells housed in a dual-glass frame. Bifacial panels perform best installed on elevated frame systems mounted over light-coloured surfaces.
Read more about the latest solar cell innovations including MBB, PERC and bifacial panels in the complete Solar Module Technology Review.
Quality and Performance
PVEL (DNV-GL) is one of the world’s leading solar module testing services based in Germany and every year the company produces the annual PV Module Reliability Scorecard Report. Over the last 5 years, JA solar panels have consistently scored in the ‘Top performer’ category among 20+ of the world’s leading solar brands tested. Note, a top performer does not mean they are ranked as number 1 but are among the highest performing modules in the group with no severe degradation or failure issues.
PVEL is one of the world’s most reputable solar PV testing organisations, thus the annual results provide a high level of confidence in the long-term performance and reliability of solar modules for both small and large-scale applications.
Warranty and Service
The current Deep Blue 3.0 series from JA solar offers an industry-standard 12-year manufacturer’s product warranty which protects against any manufacturing defects for the first 12 years. Additionally, a 25-year performance warranty offers a respectable guarantee of a minimum 84.8% power output rating after 25 years of use, which is in line with most leading Chinese panels made using the common P-type PERC cells.
The next-generation Deep Blue 4.0X panels arriving in late 2022 will be built using higher-performance N-type cells and are backed by a longer 15-year product warranty period with options to extend up to 25 years. The performance warranty also increases with a longer 30-year warranty period and lower degradation rate of 0.4% per year which equates to 87.4% after 30 years of use.
JA Solar has many service centres across the globe but currently, there is no permanent Australian-based support or service centre.
Summary
Despite being one of the world’s largest manufacturers, JA Solar is not widely known in the residential solar world as the company generally focused its efforts on promoting utility-scale panels. In general terms, JA panels could be summarised as being reliable and affordable since they are low-cost and have had very few reported issues over the years.
The current Deep Blue 3.0 range of panels are available with power ratings up to 605W and built using higher performance 182mm Gallium-doped P-type PERC cells which offer lower degradation over the expected 25-year life. The more compact DeepBlue 3.0 Light panels are built using the same cells but in a smaller format, making them a great affordable option for residential systems with up to 420W output and 21.3% efficiency.
The current generation JA Solar panels are backed by a respectable 12-year product warranty and 25-year performance warranty. Although, a longer 15-year product and 25 to 30-year performance warranty will be offered on the new generation panels arriving later in 2022 and early 2023. However, local support is clearly lacking, so it would be great to have a JA Solar support office in more countries like Australia.
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