Dust accumulation significantly affects the solar PV(Photovoltaic) performance, resulting in a considerable decrease in output power, which can be reduced by 40% with the dust of 4 g/m². Understanding the dust deposition characteristics of PV modules can provide theoretical support for selecting dust cleaning methods and formulating cleaning strategies. This paper introduced the factors affecting dust accumulation and presented the research status of dust deposition mechanisms. Moreover, the dust cleaning methods were discussed and compared. In future research, a comprehensive particle deposition model including surface energy and other factors could be established to explore the dust accumulation mechanism. Additionally, investigating the particle deposition condition to determine the deposition of particles is beneficial to understanding the dust accumulation characteristics and predicting the dust accumulation amount. Compared with mechanical cleaning methods, the cleaning effect of electrostatic (cleaning efficiency can reach 90%), coating, and acoustic wave methods is superior. If the three methods can be combined, using an electrostatic or coating method to remove small particles and acoustic waves to remove large particles is a promising approach.

The contamination deposition characteristics of insulators can be used in the development of antifouling work. Using COMSOL software, numerical simulations on the pollution-deposited performance of a porcelain three-umbrella insulator and porcelain bell jar insulator in a wind tunnel were conducted, and the simulated results were compared with the tested results. The comparison shows that the deposit amount is consistent with the order of magnitude and presents a similar tendency with Direct Current (DC) voltage variation; then the rationality of the simulation is verified. Based on these results, simulations of the natural contamination deposition on porcelain insulators and the distribution of pollution along the umbrella skirt were performed. The results indicates that, under a same wind speed, contamination of the porcelain three-umbrella insulator and porcelain bell jar insulator under DC voltage was positively correlated with the particle size. With the same particle size, the proportion of the deposit amount under DC voltage (NSDD_DC) to the deposit amount under AC voltage (NSDD_AC) of both insulators decreases with the increase in wind speed. However, the ratio increases as particle size increase. At a small wind speed, the deposit amount along the umbrella skirt of the two insulators displays a U-shaped distribution under DC voltage while there is little difference in the contamination amount of each skirt under Alternating Current (AC) voltage.