A major goal of the PV industry is to develop high-efficiency, low-cost solar cells, and devices. Recently, several approaches have been proposed for approaching the thermodynamic limit of solar energy conversion. It has been shown that the practical efficiency of different approaches can be substantially different, regardless of the fact that the theoretical efficiencies may be similar. A broad approach, combining select components and techniques from different technologies introduces the valuable advantage of expanding the range of possible materials and processes.
Papers for Seminar Report
The first paper for the seminar report is titled Very High-Efficiency Solar Cells. The paper discusses the devices which are
potentially less than one centimeter thick, require no sophisticated tracking and operate at a low concentration of around 20-suns, this record is a major step towards the goal of 50% efficiency. A consortium with around 20 contributors, led by DuPont and the University of Delaware, with substantial funding from DARPA, aims to create devices that operate at 50% efficiency in production for $1,000 m2. This aggressive goal is realizable because of recent rapid advances in materials processing, non-imaging optics, and solar cell architectures. ANU has recently joined the team, to work on silicon cells for tandem stacks. An innovative optical design, integrated with the cell design, offers the possibility of optimizing the optics, the cells, and the circuit topology to produce an ultra-high-efficiency device.
The second pdf report is titled High-Efficiency Silicon Solar Cells. Silicon remains the material of choice for photovoltaics because of its abundance, non-toxicity, high and stable cell efficiencies, the maturity of production infrastructure, and the deep and widespread level of skill available in relation to silicon devices. This paper will survey current work in high-performance silicon solar cell design and fabrication, and discuss approaches to efficiency improvements.
0 comments