Hmm, I don’t see how that could be the case unless you’re talking about a greater total area
Whether or not it checks out in the real world, it’s possible because PV conversion efficiencies are not constant. They’re a function of things including temperature, light level, direct vs indirect light, and incident light angle (even with antireflective coatings).
The power output from Si PV falls off quite a bit at high temperature, partial shade, or less direct light. Some semiconductors have much lower efficiency penalties under these conditions. So your Si might be, say, 22% efficient on a clear but temperate summer day at noon, and get you 220 W/m2. But it’s less than 22% efficient outside of the ~5 peak hours of daylight, or when the temperature of the panels rises above ~25C, or in winter.
So, an idealized panel that had a constant 16% efficiency all day, in all weather and all seasons, could make up for producing less power at noon by producing more power at 7am-10am and 5pm-8pm, and when there are some clouds, and when it’s very hot out, and in winter.
(Every time I think about this it reminds me of how in the 90s we compared CPUs on their clock speeds, and then the metric stopped making sense as we got better and more varied architectures and multi-core systems and such. The headline efficiency number just isn’t the only relevant point on a very multidimensional graph).
Whether or not it checks out in the real world, it’s possible because PV conversion efficiencies are not constant. They’re a function of things including temperature, light level, direct vs indirect light, and incident light angle (even with antireflective coatings).
The power output from Si PV falls off quite a bit at high temperature, partial shade, or less direct light. Some semiconductors have much lower efficiency penalties under these conditions. So your Si might be, say, 22% efficient on a clear but temperate summer day at noon, and get you 220 W/m2. But it’s less than 22% efficient outside of the ~5 peak hours of daylight, or when the temperature of the panels rises above ~25C, or in winter.
So, an idealized panel that had a constant 16% efficiency all day, in all weather and all seasons, could make up for producing less power at noon by producing more power at 7am-10am and 5pm-8pm, and when there are some clouds, and when it’s very hot out, and in winter.
(Every time I think about this it reminds me of how in the 90s we compared CPUs on their clock speeds, and then the metric stopped making sense as we got better and more varied architectures and multi-core systems and such. The headline efficiency number just isn’t the only relevant point on a very multidimensional graph).