Surface plasma resonance enhanced photocurrent generation in NiO photoanode based solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Wang, Zhong; Cui, Jin [Michael Grätzel Center for Mesoscopic Solar Cells, Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics Department, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, 1037 Luoyu Road, Wuhan 430074, Hubei (China); Li, Junpeng [State Key Laboratory of Advanced Technologies for Comprehensive Utilization of Platinum Metals, Kunming Institute of Precious Metals, Kunming 650106 (China); Cao, Kun; Yuan, Shuai [Michael Grätzel Center for Mesoscopic Solar Cells, Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics Department, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, 1037 Luoyu Road, Wuhan 430074, Hubei (China); Cheng, Yibing [Michael Grätzel Center for Mesoscopic Solar Cells, Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics Department, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, 1037 Luoyu Road, Wuhan 430074, Hubei (China); Department of Materials Engineering, Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria 3800 (Australia); Wang, Mingkui, E-mail: mingkui.wang@mail.hust.edu.cn [Michael Grätzel Center for Mesoscopic Solar Cells, Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics Department, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, 1037 Luoyu Road, Wuhan 430074, Hubei (China)

2015-09-15

Highlights: • SPR effect from Au-nanostructures was first investigated in NiO-based solar cells. • Enhanced photocurrent generation was observed in p-DSC and perovskite solar cell. • Au-nanorods SPR effect induced charge kinetics were investigated. - Abstract: Surface plasma resonance (SPR) effect has been demonstrated to improve solar cell performance. This work reports on the SPR effect from Au nanorod@SiO{sub 2} on p-type dye-sensitized solar cells. Au nanorod@SiO{sub 2} works as an antenna to transform photons with long wavelength into electric field followed by an enhanced excitation of dye. The devices using the NiO electrode containing Au nanorod@SiO{sub 2} shows overall power conversion efficiencies of about 0.2% in combination with I{sup −}/I{sub 3}{sup −} electrolyte, and 0.29% with T{sup −}/T{sub 2} electrolyte, which are superior to those without adding Au nanorods. Detailed investigation including spectroscopy and transient photovoltage decay measurements reveals that plasma effect of Au nanorod@SiO{sub 2} contribute to charge injection efficiency, and thus on the photocurrent. The effect of Au NRs can be further extended to the inverted planar perovskite solar cells, showing obviously improvement in photocurrent.

Semiconductor quantum dot-sensitized solar cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Tian, Jianjun; Cao, Guozhong

2013-10-31

Semiconductor quantum dots (QDs) have been drawing great attention recently as a material for solar energy conversion due to their versatile optical and electrical properties. The QD-sensitized solar cell (QDSC) is one of the burgeoning semiconductor QD solar cells that shows promising developments for the next generation of solar cells. This article focuses on recent developments in QDSCs, including 1) the effect of quantum confinement on QDSCs, 2) the multiple exciton generation (MEG) of QDs, 3) fabrication methods of QDs, and 4) nanocrystalline photoelectrodes for solar cells. We also make suggestions for future research on QDSCs. Although the efficiency of QDSCs is still low, we think there will be major breakthroughs in developing QDSCs in the future.

Silicon nanostructures for third generation photovoltaic solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Conibeer, Gavin; Green, Martin; Corkish, Richard; Cho, Young; Cho, Eun-Chel; Jiang, Chu-Wei; Fangsuwannarak, Thipwan; Pink, Edwin; Huang, Yidan; Puzzer, Tom; Trupke, Thorsten; Richards, Bryce; Shalav, Avi; Lin, Kuo-lung

2006-01-01

The concept of third generation photovoltaics is to significantly increase device efficiencies whilst still using thin film processes and abundant non-toxic materials. This can be achieved by circumventing the Shockley-Queisser limit for single band gap devices, using multiple energy threshold approaches. At University of NSW, as part of our work on Third Generation devices, we are using the energy confinement of silicon based quantum dot nanostructures to engineer wide band gap materials to be used as upper cell elements in Si based tandem cells. HRTEM data shows Si nanocrystal formation in oxide and nitride matrixes with a controlled nanocrystal size, grown by layered reactive sputtering and layered PECVD. Photoluminescence evidence for quantum confinement in the Si quantum dots in oxide agrees with the calculated increase in PL energy with reduction in dot size. Resistivity measurements with temperature give tentative proof of conduction and we are investigating junction formation in these materials. We are also using similar Si quantum dot structures in double barrier resonant tunneling structures for use in hot carrier solar cell contacts. These must collect carriers over a limited energy range. Negative differential resistance has been observed in room temperature I-V on these samples, a necessary proof of concept for selective energy filter contacts

The Effect of Dopant-Free Hole-Transport Polymers on Charge Generation and Recombination in Cesium-Bismuth-Iodide Solar Cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhu, Huimin; Johansson, Malin B; Johansson, Erik M J

2018-03-22

The photovoltaic characteristics of CsBi 3 I 10 -based solar cells with three dopant-free hole-conducting polymers are investigated. The effect on charge generation and charge recombination in the solar cells using the different polymers is studied and the results indicate that the choice of polymer strongly affects the device properties. Interestingly, for the solar cell with poly[[2,3-bis(3-octyloxyphenyl)-5,8-quinoxalinediyl]-2,5-thiophenediyl] (TQ1), the photon-to-current conversion spectrum is highly improved in the red wavelength region, suggesting that the polymer also contributes to the photocurrent generation in this case. This report provides a new direction for further optimization of Bi-halide solar cells by using dopant-free hole-transporting polymers and shows that the energy levels and the interaction between the Bi-halide and the conducting polymers are very important for solar cell performance. © 2018 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Solar energy utilization by solar cells and superblack absorbers

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Bonnet, D; Selders, M

1975-10-31

A review is presented of the physical principles responsible for the characteristics of solar cells, with particular reference to Si homojunction and CdS--Cu/sub 2/S thin film devices. Electric power generation from solar cells still appears uncompetitive economically except in special circumstances, but heating from solar energy using selective absorbers with low reemission is more promising.

Semiconductor Nanocrystals as Light Harvesters in Solar Cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Etgar, Lioz

2013-02-04

Photovoltaic cells use semiconductors to convert sunlight into electrical current and are regarded as a key technology for a sustainable energy supply. Quantum dot-based solar cells have shown great potential as next generation, high performance, low-cost photovoltaics due to the outstanding optoelectronic properties of quantum dots and their multiple exciton generation (MEG) capability. This review focuses on QDs as light harvesters in solar cells, including different structures of QD-based solar cells, such as QD heterojunction solar cells, QD-Schottky solar cells, QD-sensitized solar cells and the recent development in organic-inorganic perovskite heterojunction solar cells. Mechanisms, procedures, advantages, disadvantages and the latest results obtained in the field are described. To summarize, a future perspective is offered.

Semiconductor Nanocrystals as Light Harvesters in Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lioz Etgar

2013-02-01

Full Text Available Photovoltaic cells use semiconductors to convert sunlight into electrical current and are regarded as a key technology for a sustainable energy supply. Quantum dot-based solar cells have shown great potential as next generation, high performance, low-cost photovoltaics due to the outstanding optoelectronic properties of quantum dots and their multiple exciton generation (MEG capability. This review focuses on QDs as light harvesters in solar cells, including different structures of QD-based solar cells, such as QD heterojunction solar cells, QD-Schottky solar cells, QD-sensitized solar cells and the recent development in organic-inorganic perovskite heterojunction solar cells. Mechanisms, procedures, advantages, disadvantages and the latest results obtained in the field are described. To summarize, a future perspective is offered.

Semiconductor Nanocrystals as Light Harvesters in Solar Cells

Science.gov (United States)

Etgar, Lioz

2013-01-01

Photovoltaic cells use semiconductors to convert sunlight into electrical current and are regarded as a key technology for a sustainable energy supply. Quantum dot-based solar cells have shown great potential as next generation, high performance, low-cost photovoltaics due to the outstanding optoelectronic properties of quantum dots and their multiple exciton generation (MEG) capability. This review focuses on QDs as light harvesters in solar cells, including different structures of QD-based solar cells, such as QD heterojunction solar cells, QD-Schottky solar cells, QD-sensitized solar cells and the recent development in organic-inorganic perovskite heterojunction solar cells. Mechanisms, procedures, advantages, disadvantages and the latest results obtained in the field are described. To summarize, a future perspective is offered. PMID:28809318

Charge Generation Dynamics in Efficient All-Polymer Solar Cells: Influence of Polymer Packing and Morphology.

Science.gov (United States)

Gautam, Bhoj R; Lee, Changyeon; Younts, Robert; Lee, Wonho; Danilov, Evgeny; Kim, Bumjoon J; Gundogdu, Kenan

2015-12-23

All-polymer solar cells exhibit rapid progress in power conversion efficiency (PCE) from 2 to 7.7% over the past few years. While this improvement is primarily attributed to efficient charge transport and balanced mobility between the carriers, not much is known about the charge generation dynamics in these systems. Here we measured exciton relaxation and charge separation dynamics using ultrafast spectroscopy in polymer/polymer blends with different molecular packing and morphology. These measurements indicate that preferential face-on configuration with intermixed nanomorphology increases the charge generation efficiency. In fact, there is a direct quantitative correlation between the free charge population in the ultrafast time scales and the external quantum efficiency, suggesting not only the transport but also charge generation is key for the design of high performance all polymer solar cells.

Quantum dot solar cells

CERN Document Server

Wu, Jiang

2013-01-01

The third generation of solar cells includes those based on semiconductor quantum dots. This sophisticated technology applies nanotechnology and quantum mechanics theory to enhance the performance of ordinary solar cells. Although a practical application of quantum dot solar cells has yet to be achieved, a large number of theoretical calculations and experimental studies have confirmed the potential for meeting the requirement for ultra-high conversion efficiency. In this book, high-profile scientists have contributed tutorial chapters that outline the methods used in and the results of variou

Reconstructing Space- and Energy-Dependent Exciton Generation in Solution-Processed Inverted Organic Solar Cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Yuheng; Zhang, Yajie; Lu, Guanghao; Feng, Xiaoshan; Xiao, Tong; Xie, Jing; Liu, Xiaoyan; Ji, Jiahui; Wei, Zhixiang; Bu, Laju

2018-04-25

Photon absorption-induced exciton generation plays an important role in determining the photovoltaic properties of donor/acceptor organic solar cells with an inverted architecture. However, the reconstruction of light harvesting and thus exciton generation at different locations within organic inverted device are still not well resolved. Here, we investigate the film depth-dependent light absorption spectra in a small molecule donor/acceptor film. Including depth-dependent spectra into an optical transfer matrix method allows us to reconstruct both film depth- and energy-dependent exciton generation profiles, using which short-circuit current and external quantum efficiency of the inverted device are simulated and compared with the experimental measurements. The film depth-dependent spectroscopy, from which we are able to simultaneously reconstruct light harvesting profile, depth-dependent composition distribution, and vertical energy level variations, provides insights into photovoltaic process. In combination with appropriate material processing methods and device architecture, the method proposed in this work will help optimizing film depth-dependent optical/electronic properties for high-performance solar cells.

Generation of electrical power under human skin by subdermal solar cell arrays for implantable bioelectronic devices.

Science.gov (United States)

Song, Kwangsun; Han, Jung Hyun; Yang, Hyung Chae; Nam, Kwang Il; Lee, Jongho

2017-06-15

Medical electronic implants can significantly improve people's health and quality of life. These implants are typically powered by batteries, which usually have a finite lifetime and therefore must be replaced periodically using surgical procedures. Recently, subdermal solar cells that can generate electricity by absorbing light transmitted through skin have been proposed as a sustainable electricity source to power medical electronic implants in bodies. However, the results to date have been obtained with animal models. To apply the technology to human beings, electrical performance should be characterized using human skin covering the subdermal solar cells. In this paper, we present electrical performance results (up to 9.05mW/cm 2 ) of the implantable solar cell array under 59 human skin samples isolated from 10 cadavers. The results indicate that the power densities depend on the thickness and tone of the human skin, e.g., higher power was generated under thinner and brighter skin. The generated power density is high enough to operate currently available medical electronic implants such as pacemakers that require tens of microwatt. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Solar cell materials developing technologies

CERN Document Server

Conibeer, Gavin J

2014-01-01

This book presents a comparison of solar cell materials, including both new materials based on organics, nanostructures and novel inorganics and developments in more traditional photovoltaic materials. It surveys the materials and materials trends in the field including third generation solar cells (multiple energy level cells, thermal approaches and the modification of the solar spectrum) with an eye firmly on low costs, energy efficiency and the use of abundant non-toxic materials.

Novel nanostructures for next generation dye-sensitized solar cells

KAUST Repository

Tétreault, Nicolas

2012-01-01

Herein, we review our latest advancements in nanostructured photoanodes for next generation photovoltaics in general and dye-sensitized solar cells in particular. Bottom-up self-assembly techniques are developed to fabricate large-area 3D nanostructures that enable enhanced charge extraction and light harvesting through optical scattering or photonic crystal effects to improve photocurrent, photovoltage and fill factor. Using generalized techniques to fabricate specialized nanostructures enables specific optoelectronic and physical characteristics like conduction, charge extraction, injection, recombination and light harvesting but also helps improve mechanical flexibility and long-term stability in low cost materials. © 2012 The Royal Society of Chemistry.

Characteristics of photocurrent generation in the near-ultraviolet region in Si quantum-dot sensitized solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Uchida, Giichiro; Sato, Muneharu; Seo, Hyunwoong; Kamataki, Kunihiro; Itagaki, Naho; Koga, Kazunori; Shiratani, Masaharu

2013-01-01

We have studied photocurrent generation in Si quantum-dot (QD) sensitized solar cells, where QD thin films composed of Si nanoparticles were deposited using the double multi-hollow discharge plasma chemical vapor deposition process in an SiH 4 /H 2 and CH 4 or N 2 gas mixture. The short-circuit current density of the Si QD sensitized solar cells increases by a factor of 2.5 by using Si nanoparticles prepared by irradiation of CH 4 or N 2 plasma onto the Si nanoparticle surface. We have measured incident photon-to-current conversion efficiency (IPCE) in the near-ultraviolet range using quartz-glass front panels of the QD sensitized solar cells. With decreasing the wavelength of irradiation light, IPCE gradually increases upon light irradiation in a wavelength range less than about 600 nm, and then steeply increases below 300 nm, corresponding to 2.2 times the optical band-gap energy of Si QD film. - Highlights: • We have developed on Si quantum-dot sensitized solar cells using Si particles. • Current of solar cells increases by surface-termination of Si particles. • Incident photo-to-current conversion efficiency increases below 300 nm

Solvent Vapor Annealing-Mediated Crystallization Directs Charge Generation, Recombination and Extraction in BHJ Solar Cells

KAUST Repository

Babics, Maxime; Liang, Ru-Ze; Wang, Kai; Cruciani, Federico; Kan, Zhipeng; Wohlfahrt, Markus; Tang, Ming-Chun; Laquai, Fré dé ric; Beaujuge, Pierre

2017-01-01

Small-molecule (SM) donors that can be solution-processed with fullerene acceptors (e.g., PC61/71BM), or their “nonfullerene” counterparts, are proving particularly promising for the realization of high-efficiency bulk-heterojunction (BHJ) solar cells. In several recent studies, solvent vapor annealing (SVA) protocols have been found to yield significant BHJ device efficiency improvements via structural changes in the active layer morphologies. However, the mechanisms by which active layer morphologies evolve when subjected to SVA treatments, and the structural factors impacting charge generation, carrier transport, recombination and extraction in BHJ solar cells with SM donors and fullerene acceptors, remain important aspects to be elucidated. In this report, we show that – in BHJ solar cells with SM donors and fullerene acceptors – selective crystallization promoted by SVA mediates the development of optimized morphologies across the active layers, setting domain sizes and boundaries. Examining BHJ solar cells subjected to various SVA exposure times, with BDT[2F]QdC as the SM donor and PC71BM as the acceptor, we connect those morphological changes to specific carrier effects, showing that crystal growth effectively directs charge generation and recombination. We find that the SM donor-pure domains growing at the expense of a mixed donor-acceptor phase play a determining role, establishing optimum networks with 10-20nm-sized domains during the SVA treatment. Longer SVA times result in highly textured active layers with crystalline domains that can exceed the lengthscale of exciton diffusion, while inducing detrimental vertical morphologies and deep carrier traps. Last, we emphasize the field-dependence charge generation occurring upon SVA-mediated crystallization and link this carrier effect to the mixed phase depletion across the BHJ active layer.

Solvent Vapor Annealing-Mediated Crystallization Directs Charge Generation, Recombination and Extraction in BHJ Solar Cells

KAUST Repository

Babics, Maxime

2017-12-19

Small-molecule (SM) donors that can be solution-processed with fullerene acceptors (e.g., PC61/71BM), or their “nonfullerene” counterparts, are proving particularly promising for the realization of high-efficiency bulk-heterojunction (BHJ) solar cells. In several recent studies, solvent vapor annealing (SVA) protocols have been found to yield significant BHJ device efficiency improvements via structural changes in the active layer morphologies. However, the mechanisms by which active layer morphologies evolve when subjected to SVA treatments, and the structural factors impacting charge generation, carrier transport, recombination and extraction in BHJ solar cells with SM donors and fullerene acceptors, remain important aspects to be elucidated. In this report, we show that – in BHJ solar cells with SM donors and fullerene acceptors – selective crystallization promoted by SVA mediates the development of optimized morphologies across the active layers, setting domain sizes and boundaries. Examining BHJ solar cells subjected to various SVA exposure times, with BDT[2F]QdC as the SM donor and PC71BM as the acceptor, we connect those morphological changes to specific carrier effects, showing that crystal growth effectively directs charge generation and recombination. We find that the SM donor-pure domains growing at the expense of a mixed donor-acceptor phase play a determining role, establishing optimum networks with 10-20nm-sized domains during the SVA treatment. Longer SVA times result in highly textured active layers with crystalline domains that can exceed the lengthscale of exciton diffusion, while inducing detrimental vertical morphologies and deep carrier traps. Last, we emphasize the field-dependence charge generation occurring upon SVA-mediated crystallization and link this carrier effect to the mixed phase depletion across the BHJ active layer.

Development of Inorganic Solar Cells by Nanotechnology

Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

Yafei Zhang; Huijuan Geng; Zhihua Zhou; Jiang Wu; Zhiming Wang; Yaozhong Zhang; Zhongli Li; Liying Zhang; Zhi Yang; Huey Liang Hwang

2012-01-01

Inorganic solar cells, as durable photovoltaic devices for harvesting electric energy from sun light,have received tremendous attention due to the fear of exhausting the earth’s energy resources and damaging the living environment due to greenhouse gases. Some recent developments in nanotechnology have opened up new avenues for more relevant inorganic solar cells produced by new photovoltaic conversion concepts and effective solar energy harvesting nanostructures. In this review, the multiple exciton generation effect solar cells, hot carrier solar cells, one dimensional material constructed asymmetrical schottky barrier arrays, noble nanoparticle induced plasmonic enhancement, and light trapping nanostructured semiconductor solar cells are highlighted.

Solar thermoelectric generator

Science.gov (United States)

Toberer, Eric S.; Baranowski, Lauryn L.; Warren, Emily L.

2016-05-03

Solar thermoelectric generators (STEGs) are solid state heat engines that generate electricity from concentrated sunlight. A novel detailed balance model for STEGs is provided and applied to both state-of-the-art and idealized materials. STEGs can produce electricity by using sunlight to heat one side of a thermoelectric generator. While concentrated sunlight can be used to achieve extremely high temperatures (and thus improved generator efficiency), the solar absorber also emits a significant amount of black body radiation. This emitted light is the dominant loss mechanism in these generators. In this invention, we propose a solution to this problem that eliminates virtually all of the emitted black body radiation. This enables solar thermoelectric generators to operate at higher efficiency and achieve said efficient with lower levels of optical concentration. The solution is suitable for both single and dual axis solar thermoelectric generators.

Proton irradiation effects of amorphous silicon solar cell for solar power satellite

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Morita, Yousuke; Oshima, Takeshi [Japan Atomic Energy Research Inst., Takasaki, Gunma (Japan). Takasaki Radiation Chemistry Research Establishment; Sasaki, Susumu; Kuroda, Hideo; Ushirokawa, Akio

1997-03-01

Flexible amorphous silicon(fa-Si) solar cell module, a thin film type, is regarded as a realistic power generator for solar power satellite. The radiation resistance of fa-Si cells was investigated by the irradiations of 3,4 and 10 MeV protons. The hydrogen gas treatment of the irradiated fa-Si cells was also studied. The fa-Si cell shows high radiation resistance for proton irradiations, compared with a crystalline silicon solar cell. (author)

Characteristics of photocurrent generation in the near-ultraviolet region in Si quantum-dot sensitized solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Uchida, Giichiro, E-mail: uchida@ed.kyushu-u.ac.jp [Graduate School of Information Science and Electrical Engineering, Kyushu University, Fukuoka 819-0395 (Japan); Sato, Muneharu; Seo, Hyunwoong [Graduate School of Information Science and Electrical Engineering, Kyushu University, Fukuoka 819-0395 (Japan); Kamataki, Kunihiro [Faculty of Arts and Science, Kyushu University, Fukuoka 819-0395 (Japan); Itagaki, Naho [Graduate School of Information Science and Electrical Engineering, Kyushu University, Fukuoka 819-0395 (Japan); PRESTO, Japan Science and Technology Agency, Tokyo 102-0075 (Japan); Koga, Kazunori; Shiratani, Masaharu [Graduate School of Information Science and Electrical Engineering, Kyushu University, Fukuoka 819-0395 (Japan)

2013-10-01

We have studied photocurrent generation in Si quantum-dot (QD) sensitized solar cells, where QD thin films composed of Si nanoparticles were deposited using the double multi-hollow discharge plasma chemical vapor deposition process in an SiH{sub 4}/H{sub 2} and CH{sub 4} or N{sub 2} gas mixture. The short-circuit current density of the Si QD sensitized solar cells increases by a factor of 2.5 by using Si nanoparticles prepared by irradiation of CH{sub 4} or N{sub 2} plasma onto the Si nanoparticle surface. We have measured incident photon-to-current conversion efficiency (IPCE) in the near-ultraviolet range using quartz-glass front panels of the QD sensitized solar cells. With decreasing the wavelength of irradiation light, IPCE gradually increases upon light irradiation in a wavelength range less than about 600 nm, and then steeply increases below 300 nm, corresponding to 2.2 times the optical band-gap energy of Si QD film. - Highlights: • We have developed on Si quantum-dot sensitized solar cells using Si particles. • Current of solar cells increases by surface-termination of Si particles. • Incident photo-to-current conversion efficiency increases below 300 nm.

Harnessing Sun's Energy with Quantum Dots Based Next Generation Solar Cell.

Science.gov (United States)

Halim, Mohammad A

2012-12-27

Our energy consumption relies heavily on the three components of fossil fuels (oil, natural gas and coal) and nearly 83% of our current energy is consumed from those sources. The use of fossil fuels, however, has been viewed as a major environmental threat because of their substantial contribution to greenhouse gases which are responsible for increasing the global average temperature. Last four decades, scientists have been searching for alternative sources of energy which need to be environmentally clean, efficient, cost-effective, renewable, and sustainable. One of the promising sustainable sources of energy can be achieved by harnessing sun energy through silicon wafer, organic polymer, inorganic dye, and quantum dots based solar cells. Among them, quantum dots have an exceptional property in that they can excite multiple electrons using only one photon. These dots can easily be synthesized, processed in solution, and incorporated into solar cell application. Interestingly, the quantum dots solar cells can exceed the Shockley - Queisser limit; however, it is a great challenge for other solar cell materials to exceed the limit. Theoretically, the quantum dots solar cell can boost the power conversion efficiency up to 66% and even higher to 80%. Moreover, in changing the size of the quantum dots one can utilize the Sun's broad spectrum of visible and infrared ranges. This review briefly overviews the present performance of different materials-based solar cells including silicon wafer, dye-sensitized, and organic solar cells. In addition, recent advances of the quantum dots based solar cells which utilize cadmium sulfide/selenide, lead sulfide/selenide, and new carbon dots as light harvesting materials has been reviewed. A future outlook is sketched as to how one could improve the efficiency up to 10% from the current highest efficiency of 6.6%.

Dye-sensitized solar cells for efficient power generation under ambient lighting

Science.gov (United States)

Freitag, Marina; Teuscher, Joël; Saygili, Yasemin; Zhang, Xiaoyu; Giordano, Fabrizio; Liska, Paul; Hua, Jianli; Zakeeruddin, Shaik M.; Moser, Jacques-E.; Grätzel, Michael; Hagfeldt, Anders

2017-06-01

Solar cells that operate efficiently under indoor lighting are of great practical interest as they can serve as electric power sources for portable electronics and devices for wireless sensor networks or the Internet of Things. Here, we demonstrate a dye-sensitized solar cell (DSC) that achieves very high power-conversion efficiencies (PCEs) under ambient light conditions. Our photosystem combines two judiciously designed sensitizers, coded D35 and XY1, with the copper complex Cu(II/I)(tmby) as a redox shuttle (tmby, 4,4‧,6,6‧-tetramethyl-2,2‧-bipyridine), and features a high open-circuit photovoltage of 1.1 V. The DSC achieves an external quantum efficiency for photocurrent generation that exceeds 90% across the whole visible domain from 400 to 650 nm, and achieves power outputs of 15.6 and 88.5 μW cm-2 at 200 and 1,000 lux, respectively, under illumination from a model Osram 930 warm-white fluorescent light tube. This translates into a PCE of 28.9%.

Application of carbon nanotubes in perovskite solar cells: A review

Science.gov (United States)

Oo, Thet Tin; Debnath, Sujan

2017-11-01

Solar power, as alternative renewable energy source, has gained momentum in global energy generation in recent time. Solar photovoltaics (PV) systems now fulfill a significant portion of electricity demand and the capacity of solar PV capacity is growing every year. PV cells efficiency has improved significantly following decades of research, evolving into third generations of PV cells. These third generation PV cells are set out to provide low-cost and efficient PV systems, further improving the commercial competitiveness of solar energy generation. Among these latest generations of PV cells, perovskite solar cells have gained attraction due to the simple manufacturing process and the immense growth in PV efficiency in a short period of research and development. Despite these advantages, perovskite solar cells are known for the weak stability and decomposition in exposure to humidity and high temperature, hindering the possibility of commercialization. This paper will discuss the role of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) in improving the efficiency and stability of perovskite solar cells, in various components such as perovskite layer and hole transport layer, as well as the application of CNTs in unique aspects. These includes the use of CNTs fiber in making the perovskite solar cells flexible, as well as simplification of perovskite PV production by using CNT flash evaporation printing process. Despite these advances, challenges remain in incorporation CNTs into perovskite such as lower conversion efficiency compared to rare earth metals and improvements need to be made. Thus, the paper will be also highlighting the CNTs materials suggested for further research and improvement of perovskite solar cells.

Concentrated solar power generation using solar receivers

Science.gov (United States)

Anderson, Bruce N.; Treece, William Dean; Brown, Dan; Bennhold, Florian; Hilgert, Christoph

2017-08-08

Inventive concentrated solar power systems using solar receivers, and related devices and methods, are generally described. Low pressure solar receivers are provided that function to convert solar radiation energy to thermal energy of a working fluid, e.g., a working fluid of a power generation or thermal storage system. In some embodiments, low pressure solar receivers are provided herein that are useful in conjunction with gas turbine based power generation systems.

ANALYSING SOLAR-WIND HYBRID POWER GENERATING SYSTEM

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mustafa ENGİN

2005-02-01

Full Text Available In this paper, a solar-wind hybrid power generating, system that will be used for security lighting was designed. Hybrid system was installed and solar cells, wind turbine, battery bank, charge regulators and inverter performance values were measured through the whole year. Using measured values of overall system efficiency, reliability, demanded energy cost per kWh were calculated, and percentage of generated energy according to resources were defined. We also include in the paper a discussion of new strategies to improve hybrid power generating system performance and demanded energy cost per kWh.

Development of Inorganic Solar Cells by Nano-technology

Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

Yafei Zhang; HueyLiang Hwang; Huijuan Geng; Zhihua Zhou; Jiang Wu; Zhiming Wang; Yaozhong Zhang; Zhongli Li; Liying Zhang; Zhi Yang

2012-01-01

Inorganic solar cells, as durable photovoltaic devices for harvesting electric energy from sun light, have received tremendous attention due to the fear of exhausting the earth’s energy resources and damaging the living environment due to greenhouse gases. Some recent developments in nanotechnology have opened up new avenues for more relevant inorganic solar cells produced by new photovoltaic conversion concepts and effective solar energy harvesting nanostructures. In this review, the multiple exciton generation effect solar cells, hot carrier solar cells, one dimensional material constructed asymmetrical schottky barrier arrays, noble nanoparticle induced plasmonic enhancement, and light trapping nanostructured semiconductor solar cells are highlighted.

Solar thermal aided power generation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hu, Eric; Yang, YongPing; Nishimura, Akira; Yilmaz, Ferdi; Kouzani, Abbas

2010-01-01

Fossil fuel based power generation is and will still be the back bone of our world economy, albeit such form of power generation significantly contributes to global CO 2 emissions. Solar energy is a clean, environmental friendly energy source for power generation, however solar photovoltaic electricity generation is not practical for large commercial scales due to its cost and high-tech nature. Solar thermal is another way to use solar energy to generate power. Many attempts to establish solar (solo) thermal power stations have been practiced all over the world. Although there are some advantages in solo solar thermal power systems, the efficiencies and costs of these systems are not so attractive. Alternately by modifying, if possible, the existing coal-fired power stations to generate green sustainable power, a much more efficient means of power generation can be reached. This paper presents the concept of solar aided power generation in conventional coal-fired power stations, i.e., integrating solar (thermal) energy into conventional fossil fuelled power generation cycles (termed as solar aided thermal power). The solar aided power generation (SAPG) concept has technically been derived to use the strong points of the two technologies (traditional regenerative Rankine cycle with relatively higher efficiency and solar heating at relatively low temperature range). The SAPG does not only contribute to increase the efficiencies of the conventional power station and reduce its emission of the greenhouse gases, but also provides a better way to use solar heat to generate the power. This paper presents the advantages of the SAPG at conceptual level.

High performance a-Si solar cells and new fabrication methods for a-Si solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Nakano, S.; Kuwano, Y.; Ohnishi, M.

1986-12-01

The super chamber, a separated UHV reaction-chamber system has been developed. A conversion efficiency of 11.7% was obtained for an a-Si solar cell using a high-quality i-layer deposited by the super chamber, and a p-layer fabricated by a photo-CVD method. As a new material, amorphous superlattice-structure films were fabricated by the photo-CVD method for the first time. Superlattice structure p-layer a-Si solar cells were fabricated, and a conversion efficiency of 10.5% was obtained. For the fabrication of integrated type a-Si solar cell modules, a laser pattering method was investigated. A thermal analysis of the multilayer structure was done. It was confirmed that selective scribing for a-Si, TCO and metal film is possible by controlling the laser power density. Recently developed a-Si solar power generation systems and a-Si solar cell roofing tiles are also described.

Candidate solar cell materials for photovoltaic conversion in a solar power satellite /SPS/

Science.gov (United States)

Glaser, P. E.; Almgren, D. W.

1978-01-01

In recognition of the obstacles to solar-generated baseload power on earth, proposals have been made to locate solar power satellites in geosynchronous earth orbit (GEO), where solar energy would be available 24 hours a day during most of the time of the year. In an SPS, the electricity produced by solar energy conversion will be fed to microwave generators forming part of a planar phase-array transmitting antenna. The antenna is designed to precisely direct a microwave beam of very low intensity to one or more receiving antennas at desired locations on earth. At the receiving antenna, the microwave energy will be safely and efficiently reconverted to electricity and then be transmitted to consumers. An SPS system will include a number of satellites in GEO. Attention is given to the photovoltaic option for solar energy conversion in GEO, solar cell requirements, the availability of materials, the implication of large production volumes, requirements for high-volume manufacture of solar cell arrays, and the effects of concentration ratio on solar cell array area.

Emerging Semitransparent Solar Cells: Materials and Device Design.

Science.gov (United States)

Tai, Qidong; Yan, Feng

2017-09-01

Semitransparent solar cells can provide not only efficient power-generation but also appealing images and show promising applications in building integrated photovoltaics, wearable electronics, photovoltaic vehicles and so forth in the future. Such devices have been successfully realized by incorporating transparent electrodes in new generation low-cost solar cells, including organic solar cells (OSCs), dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs) and organometal halide perovskite solar cells (PSCs). In this review, the advances in the preparation of semitransparent OSCs, DSCs, and PSCs are summarized, focusing on the top transparent electrode materials and device designs, which are all crucial to the performance of these devices. Techniques for optimizing the efficiency, color and transparency of the devices are addressed in detail. Finally, a summary of the research field and an outlook into the future development in this area are provided. © 2017 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Scaling Up ITO-free solar cells

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Galagan, Yulia; Coenen, Erica W. C.; Zimmermann, Birger

2014-01-01

Indium-tin-oxide-free (ITO-free) polymer solar cells with composite electrodes containing current-collecting grids and a semitransparent poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene):polystyrenesulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) conductor are demonstrated. The up-scaling of the length of the solar cell from 1 to 6 cm...... resistances. The performance of ITO-free organic solar cells with different dimensions and different electrode resistances are evaluated for different light intensities. The current generation and electric potential distribution are found to not be uniformly distributed in large-area devices at simulated 1...

Harnessing Sun’s Energy with Quantum Dots Based Next Generation Solar Cell

Science.gov (United States)

Halim, Mohammad A.

2012-01-01

Our energy consumption relies heavily on the three components of fossil fuels (oil, natural gas and coal) and nearly 83% of our current energy is consumed from those sources. The use of fossil fuels, however, has been viewed as a major environmental threat because of their substantial contribution to greenhouse gases which are responsible for increasing the global average temperature. Last four decades, scientists have been searching for alternative sources of energy which need to be environmentally clean, efficient, cost-effective, renewable, and sustainable. One of the promising sustainable sources of energy can be achieved by harnessing sun energy through silicon wafer, organic polymer, inorganic dye, and quantum dots based solar cells. Among them, quantum dots have an exceptional property in that they can excite multiple electrons using only one photon. These dots can easily be synthesized, processed in solution, and incorporated into solar cell application. Interestingly, the quantum dots solar cells can exceed the Shockley-Queisser limit; however, it is a great challenge for other solar cell materials to exceed the limit. Theoretically, the quantum dots solar cell can boost the power conversion efficiency up to 66% and even higher to 80%. Moreover, in changing the size of the quantum dots one can utilize the Sun’s broad spectrum of visible and infrared ranges. This review briefly overviews the present performance of different materials-based solar cells including silicon wafer, dye-sensitized, and organic solar cells. In addition, recent advances of the quantum dots based solar cells which utilize cadmium sulfide/selenide, lead sulfide/selenide, and new carbon dots as light harvesting materials has been reviewed. A future outlook is sketched as to how one could improve the efficiency up to 10% from the current highest efficiency of 6.6%. PMID:28348320

Variational method for the minimization of entropy generation in solar cells

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Smit, S.; Kessels, W.M.M.

2015-01-01

In this work, a method is presented to extend traditional solar cell simulation tools to make it possible to calculate the most efficient design of practical solar cells. The method is based on the theory of nonequilibrium thermodynamics, which is used to derive an expression for the local entropy

Photoelectrochemistry of metallo-octacarboxyphthalocyanines for the development of dye solar cells

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Mphahlele, N

2011-09-01

Full Text Available Significant attention is being paid to dye solar cells (DSCs) as the next generation in solar cell technology for their low cost alternative as compared to solid state solar cells....

Solar Cell Panel and the Method for Manufacturing the Same

Science.gov (United States)

Richards, Benjamin C. (Inventor); Sarver, Charles F. (Inventor); Naidenkova, Maria (Inventor)

2016-01-01

According to an aspect of an embodiment of the present disclosure, there is provided a solar cell panel and a method for manufacturing the same. The solar cell panel comprises: a solar cell for generating electric power from sunlight; a coverglass for covering the solar cell; transparent shims, which are disposed between the solar cell and the coverglass at the points where the distance between the solar cell and the coverglass needs to be controlled, and form a space between the solar cell and the coverglass; and adhesive layer, which fills the space between the solar cell and the coverglass and has the thickness the same as that of the transparent shims.

Neutral- and Multi-Colored Semitransparent Perovskite Solar Cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Lee, Kyu-Tae; Guo, L Jay; Park, Hui Joon

2016-04-11

In this review, we summarize recent works on perovskite solar cells with neutral- and multi-colored semitransparency for building-integrated photovoltaics and tandem solar cells. The perovskite solar cells exploiting microstructured arrays of perovskite "islands" and transparent electrodes-the latter of which include thin metallic films, metal nanowires, carbon nanotubes, graphenes, and transparent conductive oxides for achieving optical transparency-are investigated. Moreover, the perovskite solar cells with distinctive color generation, which are enabled by engineering the band gap of the perovskite light-harvesting semiconductors with chemical management and integrating with photonic nanostructures, including microcavity, are discussed. We conclude by providing future research directions toward further performance improvements of the semitransparent perovskite solar cells.

Optimization of charge-carrier generation in amorphous-silicon thin-film tandem solar cell backed by two-dimensional metallic surface-relief grating

Science.gov (United States)

Civiletti, Benjamin J.; Anderson, Tom H.; Ahmad, Faiz; Monk, Peter B.; Lakhtakia, Akhlesh

2017-08-01

The rigorous coupled-wave approach was implemented in a three-dimensional setting to calculate the chargecarrier-generation rate in a thin-film solar cell with multiple amorphous-silicon p-i-n junctions. The solar cell comprised a front antireflection window; three electrically isolated p-i-n junctions in tandem; and a periodically corrugated silver back-reflector with hillock-shaped corrugations arranged on a hexagonal lattice. The differential evolution algorithm (DEA) was used to maximize the charge-carrier-generation rate over a set of selected optical and electrical parameters. This optimization exercise minimized the bandgap of the topmost i-layer but all other parameters turned out to be uninfluential. More importantly, the exercise led to a configuration that would very likely render the solar cell inefficient. Therefore, another optimization exercise was conducted to maximize power density. The resulting configuration was optimal over all parameters.

Solar fuels generator

Science.gov (United States)

Lewis, Nathan S.; Spurgeon, Joshua M.

2016-10-25

The solar fuels generator includes an ionically conductive separator between a gaseous first phase and a second phase. A photoanode uses one or more components of the first phase to generate cations during operation of the solar fuels generator. A cation conduit is positioned provides a pathway along which the cations travel from the photoanode to the separator. The separator conducts the cations. A second solid cation conduit conducts the cations from the separator to a photocathode.

METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR CHARACTERIZATION OF A SOLAR CELL

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

2017-01-01

; and estimating variations in the solar cell, thereby electrically characterizing the solar cell. The disclosure further relates to a solar cell characterization apparatus for characterization of a solar cell, comprising: a light source for generating an optical probe light; a modulation unit, configured...... to produce modulated probe light by modulating the optical probe light with a modulation frequency of between 100 kHz and 0 MHz; a light scanning unit for scanning the modulated probe light such that said modulated probe light is incident on at least a part of the surface of the solar cell; and a 1 signal...

Stability and Degradation of Organic and Polymer Solar Cells

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Organic photovoltaics (OPV) are a new generation of solar cells with the potential to offer very short energy pay back times, mechanical flexibility and significantly lower production costs compared to traditional crystalline photovoltaic systems. A weakness of OPV is their comparative instability...... during operation and this is a critical area of research towards the successful development and commercialization of these 3rd generation solar cells. Covering both small molecule and polymer solar cells, Stability and Degradation of Organic and Polymer Solar Cells summarizes the state of the art...... understanding of stability and provides a detailed analysis of the mechanisms by which degradation occurs. Following an introductory chapter which compares different photovoltaic technologies, the book focuses on OPV degradation, discussing the origin and characterization of the instability and describing...

Performance analysis of a co-generation system using solar energy and SOFC technology

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Akikur, R.K.; Saidur, R.; Ping, H.W.; Ullah, K.R.

2014-01-01

Highlights: • A new concept of a cogeneration system is proposed and investigated. • The system comprises solar collector, PV, SOFC and heat exchanger. • 83.6% Power and heat generation efficiency has been found at fuel cell mode. • 85.1% Efficiency of SOSE has been found at H2 production mode. • The heat to power ratio of SOFC mode has been found about 0.917. - Abstract: Due to the increasing future energy demands and global warming, the renewable alternative energy sources and the efficient power systems have been getting importance over the last few decades. Among the renewable energy technologies, the solar energy coupling with fuel cell technology will be the promising possibilities for the future green energy solutions. Fuel cell cogeneration is an auspicious technology that can potentially reduce the energy consumption and environmental impact associated with serving building electrical and thermal demands. In this study, performance assessment of a co-generation system is presented to deliver electrical and thermal energy using the solar energy and the reversible solid oxide fuel cell. A mathematical model of the co-generation system is developed. To illustrate the performance, the system is considered in three operation modes: a solar-solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) mode, which is low solar radiation time when the solar photovoltaic (PV) and SOFC are used for electric and heat load supply; a solar-solid oxide steam electrolyzer (SOSE) mode, which is high solar radiation time when PV is used for power supply to the electrical load and to the steam electrolyzer to generate hydrogen (H 2 ); and a SOFC mode, which is the power and heat generation mode of reversible SOFC using the storage H 2 at night time. Also the effects of solar radiation on the system performances and the effects of temperature on RSOFC are analyzed. In this study, 100 kW electric loads are considered and analyzed for the power and heat generation in those three modes to evaluate

Quantum-Dot-Based Solar Cells: Recent Advances, Strategies, and Challenges.

Science.gov (United States)

Kim, Mee Rahn; Ma, Dongling

2015-01-02

Among next-generation photovoltaic systems requiring low cost and high efficiency, quantum dot (QD)-based solar cells stand out as a very promising candidate because of the unique and versatile characteristics of QDs. The past decade has already seen rapid conceptual and technological advances on various aspects of QD solar cells, and diverse opportunities, which QDs can offer, predict that there is still ample room for further development and breakthroughs. In this Perspective, we first review the attractive advantages of QDs, such as size-tunable band gaps and multiple exciton generation (MEG), beneficial to solar cell applications. We then analyze major strategies, which have been extensively explored and have largely contributed to the most recent and significant achievements in QD solar cells. Finally, their high potential and challenges are discussed. In particular, QD solar cells are considered to hold immense potential to overcome the theoretical efficiency limit of 31% for single-junction cells.

Electric power generation using photovoltaic solar cells for low income rural population; Geracao de energia eletrica com celula solar fotovoltaica para populacao rural de baixa renda

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Gastaldi, Andre Fava; Souza, Teofilo Miguel de; Mesquita, Rafael Pimenta [Universidade Estadual Paulista Julio de Mesquita Filho (UNESP), Guaratingueta, SP (Brazil). Centro de Energias Renovaveis], e-mail: teofilo@feg.unesp.br

2004-07-01

With the growing electric energy use demand and almost not expansion of the energy mesh (basically composed by hydroelectric plants) existing in the country, several others methods of alternative energy generation may be necessary. Beyond that, the usually employed energy is becoming much more costly, rarer and politically more impracticable like burn fuels as oil and coal. The use of renewable approaches of energy, that are 'infinite' energies (as the wind and the light of the sun, for example), can become an excellent alternative. In this new energy group, the solar energy transformed by the use of photo voltage cells is becoming very important. The 'clear' solar radiation tends to be a more intelligent and practical option, and the future technology of energy storage will be able to solve the problem of the regions that have less sunny days. Its main advantages on the other alternative sources of energy are the trustworthiness and the previsibility. Its biggest disadvantage consists on the fact that technical limitations can not allow a solar energy generator to distribute electricity for a city. It is interesting to notice that with the development of projects as this in alternative energy, isolated areas that does not access electricity distribution network (as some far regions), it has become the most viable option of generation of electric energy. Another point is that even with the distribution network it has to be checked if it is possible to use this electricity consulting the company credential that work at those localities of consumption. Moreover, many regions of the country already installed the solar energy system for water heating, confirming that, the existing structure allows the installation of a a solar cells generation energy system without many problems. In this project, we introduce a method for electric energy generation by solar cells for rural population of low gains. This option uses low cost materials but with a good

Symposium GC: Nanoscale Charge Transport in Excitonic Solar Cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Bommisetty, Venkat [Univ. of South Dakota, Vermillion, SD (United States)

2011-06-23

This paper provides a summary only and table of contents of the sessions. Excitonic solar cells, including all-organic, hybrid organic-inorganic and dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs), offer strong potential for inexpensive and large-area solar energy conversion. Unlike traditional inorganic semiconductor solar cells, where all the charge generation and collection processes are well understood, these excitonic solar cells contain extremely disordered structures with complex interfaces which results in large variations in nanoscale electronic properties and has a strong influence on carrier generation, transport, dissociation and collection. Detailed understanding of these processes is important for fabrication of highly efficient solar cells. Efforts to improve efficiency are underway at a large number of research groups throughout the world focused on inorganic and organic semiconductors, photonics, photophysics, charge transport, nanoscience, ultrafast spectroscopy, photonics, semiconductor processing, device physics, device structures, interface structure etc. Rapid progress in this multidisciplinary area requires strong synergetic efforts among researchers from diverse backgrounds. Such effort can lead to novel methods for development of new materials with improved photon harvesting and interfacial treatments for improved carrier transport, process optimization to yield ordered nanoscale morphologies with well defined electronic structures.

High Temperature InGaN-based Solar Cells

Data.gov (United States)

National Aeronautics and Space Administration — An efficient generation of solar power in a space environment is an enduring challenging for all NASA missions. The current available solar cells, however, suffer...

A review on solar cells from Si-single crystals to porous materials and quantum dots.

Science.gov (United States)

Badawy, Waheed A

2015-03-01

Solar energy conversion to electricity through photovoltaics or to useful fuel through photoelectrochemical cells was still a main task for research groups and developments sectors. In this article we are reviewing the development of the different generations of solar cells. The fabrication of solar cells has passed through a large number of improvement steps considering the technological and economic aspects. The first generation solar cells were based on Si wafers, mainly single crystals. Permanent researches on cost reduction and improved solar cell efficiency have led to the marketing of solar modules having 12-16% solar conversion efficiency. Application of polycrystalline Si and other forms of Si have reduced the cost but on the expense of the solar conversion efficiency. The second generation solar cells were based on thin film technology. Thin films of amorphous Si, CIS (copper-indium-selenide) and t-Si were employed. Solar conversion efficiencies of about 12% have been achieved with a remarkable cost reduction. The third generation solar cells are based on nano-crystals and nano-porous materials. An advanced photovoltaic cell, originally developed for satellites with solar conversion efficiency of 37.3%, based on concentration of the solar spectrum up to 400 suns was developed. It is based on extremely thin concentration cells. New sensitizer or semiconductor systems are necessary to broaden the photo-response in solar spectrum. Hybrids of solar and conventional devices may provide an interim benefit in seeking economically valuable devices. New quantum dot solar cells based on CdSe-TiO2 architecture have been developed.

A review on solar cells from Si-single crystals to porous materials and quantum dots

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Waheed A. Badawy

2015-03-01

Full Text Available Solar energy conversion to electricity through photovoltaics or to useful fuel through photoelectrochemical cells was still a main task for research groups and developments sectors. In this article we are reviewing the development of the different generations of solar cells. The fabrication of solar cells has passed through a large number of improvement steps considering the technological and economic aspects. The first generation solar cells were based on Si wafers, mainly single crystals. Permanent researches on cost reduction and improved solar cell efficiency have led to the marketing of solar modules having 12–16% solar conversion efficiency. Application of polycrystalline Si and other forms of Si have reduced the cost but on the expense of the solar conversion efficiency. The second generation solar cells were based on thin film technology. Thin films of amorphous Si, CIS (copper–indium–selenide and t-Si were employed. Solar conversion efficiencies of about 12% have been achieved with a remarkable cost reduction. The third generation solar cells are based on nano-crystals and nano-porous materials. An advanced photovoltaic cell, originally developed for satellites with solar conversion efficiency of 37.3%, based on concentration of the solar spectrum up to 400 suns was developed. It is based on extremely thin concentration cells. New sensitizer or semiconductor systems are necessary to broaden the photo-response in solar spectrum. Hybrids of solar and conventional devices may provide an interim benefit in seeking economically valuable devices. New quantum dot solar cells based on CdSe–TiO2 architecture have been developed.

Tandem photovoltaic solar cells and increased solar energy conversion efficiency

Science.gov (United States)

Loferski, J. J.

1976-01-01

Tandem photovoltaic cells, as proposed by Jackson (1955) to increase the efficiency of solar energy conversion, involve the construction of a system of stacked p/n homojunction photovoltaic cells composed of different semiconductors. It had been pointed out by critics, however, that the total power which could be extracted from the cells in the stack placed side by side was substantially greater than the power obtained from the stacked cells. A reexamination of the tandem cell concept in view of the development of the past few years is conducted. It is concluded that the use of tandem cell systems in flat plate collectors, as originally envisioned by Jackson, may yet become feasible as a result of the development of economically acceptable solar cells for large scale terrestrial power generation.

Biomass converted carbon quantum dots for all-weather solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Meng, Yuanyuan; Zhang, Yue; Sun, Weiyin; Wang, Min; He, Benlin; Chen, Haiyan; Tang, Qunwei

2017-01-01

Highlights: •CQDs are converted from soybean powders by a hydrothermal method. •The biomass converted CQDs are used for all-weather DSSCs. •The so-called all-weather DSSCs can generate electricity in the daytime and dark. •A dark efficiency as high as 7.97% is determined on the all-weather photovoltaics. •The launched solar cell extend our knowledge of advanced all-weather solar cells. -- Abstract: A great challenge for state-of-the-art photovoltaic devices is to realize electric power generation in all weathers. We constructively demonstrate here the conversion from biomass to carbon quantum dots for all-weather carbon quantum dot solar cells that can generate electricity in the daytime and in the dark. The combination of green-emitting long persistence phosphors with mesoscopic titanium dioxide realizes optical storage by composite photoanode under illumination and excitation to monochromatic green light in the dark. The optimized all-weather solar cell yields maximized dark power conversion efficiency as high as 7.97% along with persistent electricity output for several hours. This work begins a photovoltaic revolution to forward all-weather solar cells as future energy solutions.

Solar cell development requires effective metrology: lock-in thermography can help

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Tarin, M.; Overstreet, R.

2013-01-01

The environmental and political benefits of renewable energy sources are understood by any informed observer with an interest in the future sustainability of our planet. Solar cells are getting a lot of attention - not only because they are a clean source of renewable energy, but also because their energy input is essentially free. Through the use of photovoltaic (PV) technology, solar cells convert the sun's rays directly into electricity. According to John Boyd, a technology analyst at Semiconductor Insights, 'a solar array 150 x 150 km could, in principle, meet all of North America's energy needs.' Assuming adequate installation space, and a solution for power grid load balancing, the main problem remaining to be solved is achieving grid parity - the point at which the cost of generating PV power is competitive with that of generating power using existing power plants. Currently, the cost of generating PV power is approximately $0.20/kWh globally. This is still roughly twice the rate of coal-based alternatives. The current generation of silicon solar cells typically achieves conversion efficiencies between 15% and 25%, while typical metallic thin film cells have efficiencies in the 5% to 20% range, depending on materials used. R and D efforts are aimed at increasing the efficiency of both solar cell technologies and reducing PV cell power generation costs to around $0.05/kWh. The primary challenges in reducing the cost of PV power generation exist in the production phase of the development cycle. Too many defects in the semiconducting material structure go undetected before solar cells are put into use. Identifying these defects requires efficient, cost effective test and measurement methods for characterizing a cell's performance and its electronic structure.(author)

MEMS Solar Generators

OpenAIRE

Grbovic, Dragoslav; Osswald, Sebastian

2011-01-01

Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited Using MEMS bimaterial structures to build highly efficient solar energy generators. This is a novel approach that utilizes developments in the area of bimaterial sensors and applies them in the field of solar energy harvesting.

Applications of Fluorogens with Rotor Structures in Solar Cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Ong, Kok-Haw; Liu, Bin

2017-05-29

Solar cells are devices that convert light energy into electricity. To drive greater adoption of solar cell technologies, higher cell efficiencies and reductions in manufacturing cost are necessary. Fluorogens containing rotor structures may be helpful in addressing some of these challenges due to their unique twisted structures and photophysics. In this review, we discuss the applications of rotor-containing molecules as dyes for luminescent down-shifting layers and luminescent solar concentrators, where their aggregation-induced emission properties and large Stokes shifts are highly desirable. We also discuss the applications of molecules containing rotors in third-generation solar cell technologies, namely dye-sensitized solar cells and organic photovoltaics, where the twisted 3-dimensional rotor structures are used primarily for aggregation control. Finally, we discuss perspectives on the future role of molecules containing rotor structures in solar cell technologies.

Dust Removal from Solar Cells

Science.gov (United States)

Ashpis, David E. (Inventor)

2015-01-01

A solar panel cleaning device includes a solar panel having a plurality of photovoltaic cells arranged in rows and embedded in the solar panel with space between the rows. A transparent dielectric overlay is affixed to the solar panel. A plurality of electrode pairs each of which includes an upper and a lower electrode are arranged on opposite sides of the transparent dielectric and are affixed thereto. The electrodes may be transparent electrodes which may be arranged without concern for blocking sunlight to the solar panel. The solar panel may be a dielectric and its dielectric properties may be continuously and spatially variable. Alternatively the dielectric used may have dielectric segments which produce different electrical field and which affects the wind "generated."

Introduction to solar cell production

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kim, Gyeong Hae; Lee, Jun Sin

2009-08-01

This book introduces solar cell production. It is made up eight chapters, which are summary of solar cell with structure and prospect of the business, special variable of solar cell on light of the sun and factor causing variable of solar cell, production of solar cell with surface texturing, diffusion, metal printing dry and firing and edge isolation, process of solar cell on silicone wafer for solar cell, forming of electrodes, introduction of thin film solar cell on operating of solar cell, process of production and high efficiency of thin film solar cell, sorting of solar cell and production with background of silicone solar cell and thin film solar cell, structure and production of thin film solar cell and compound solar cell, introduction of solar cell module and the Industrial condition and prospect of solar cell.

Solar energy powered microbial fuel cell with a reversible bioelectrode.

Science.gov (United States)

Strik, David P B T B; Hamelers, Hubertus V M; Buisman, Cees J N

2010-01-01

The solar energy powered microbial fuel cell is an emerging technology for electricity generation via electrochemically active microorganisms fueled by solar energy via in situ photosynthesized metabolites from algae, cyanobacteria, or living higher plants. A general problem with microbial fuel cells is the pH membrane gradient which reduces cell voltage and power output. This problem is caused by acid production at the anode, alkaline production at the cathode, and the nonspecific proton exchange through the membrane. Here we report a solution for a new kind of solar energy powered microbial fuel cell via development of a reversible bioelectrode responsible for both biocatalyzed anodic and cathodic electron transfer. Anodic produced protons were used for the cathodic reduction reaction which held the formation of a pH membrane gradient. The microbial fuel cell continuously generated electricity and repeatedly reversed polarity dependent on aeration or solar energy exposure. Identified organisms within biocatalyzing biofilm of the reversible bioelectrode were algae, (cyano)bacteria and protozoa. These results encourage application of solar energy powered microbial fuel cells.

Dye-sensitised solar cell (artificial photosynthesis)

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Le Roux, Lukas J

2006-02-01

Full Text Available is the nano- crystalline TiO2dye- sensitised solar cell (DSC), in conjunction with several new concepts, such as nanotechnology and molecular devices. An efficient and low-cost cell can be produced by using simple materials. The production process generates...

Modification of circuit module of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSC) for solar windows applications

Science.gov (United States)

Hastuti, S. D.; Nurosyid, F.; Supriyanto, A.; Suryana, R.

2016-11-01

This research has been conducted to obtain a modification of circuit producing the best efficiency of solar window modules as an alternative energy for daily usage. Solar window module was constructed by DSSC cells. In the previous research, solar window was created by a single cell of DSSC. Because it had small size, it could not be applied in the manufacture of solar window. Fabrication of solar window required a larger size of DSSC cell. Therefore, in the next research, a module of solar window was fabricated by connecting few cells of DSSC. It was done by using external electrical circuit method which was modified in the formation of series circuit and parallel circuit. Its fabrication used six cells of DSSC with the size of each cell was 1 cm × 9 cm. DSSC cells were sandwich structures constructed by an active layer of TiO2 as the working electrode, electrolyte solution, dye, and carbon layer. Characterization of module was started one by one, from one cell, two cells, three cells, until six cells of a module. It was conducted to recognize the increasing efficiency value as the larger surface area given. The efficiency of solar window module with series circuit was 0.06%, while using parallel circuit was 0.006%. Module with series circuit generated the higher voltage as the larger surface area. Meanwhile, module through parallel circuit tended to produce the constant voltage as the larger surface area. It was caused by the influence of resistance within the cable in each module. Module with circuit parallel used a longer cable than module with series circuit, so that its resistance increased. Therefore, module with parallel circuit generated voltage that tended to be constant and resulted small efficiency compared to the module with series circuit. It could be concluded that series external circuit was the best modification which could produce the higher efficiency.

Experimental analysis and modeling of the IV characteristics of photovoltaic solar cells under solar spectrum spot illumination

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Munji, M.K., E-mail: mathew.munji@nmmu.ac.z [Department of Physics, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, PO Box 7700 Port Elizabeth 6031 (South Africa); Dyk, E.E. van; Vorster, F.J. [Department of Physics, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, PO Box 7700 Port Elizabeth 6031 (South Africa)

2009-12-01

In this paper, some models that have been put forward to explain the characteristics of a photovoltaic solar cell device under solar spot-illumination are investigated. In the experimental procedure, small areas of the cell were selected and illuminated at different solar intensities. The solar cell open circuit voltage (V{sub oc}) and short circuit current (I{sub sc}) obtained at different illumination intensities was used to determine the solar cell ideality factor. By varying the illuminated area on the solar cell, changes in the ideality factor were studied. The ideality factor obtained increases with decreasing illumination surface ratio. The photo-generated current at the illuminated part of the cell is assumed to act as a dc source that injects charge carriers into the p-n junction of the whole solar cell while the dark region of the solar cell operates in a low space charge recombination regime with small diffusion currents. From this analysis, a different model of a spot illuminated cell that uses the variation of ideality factor with the illuminated area is proposed.

Experimental analysis and modeling of the IV characteristics of photovoltaic solar cells under solar spectrum spot illumination

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Munji, M.K.; Dyk, E.E. van; Vorster, F.J.

2009-01-01

In this paper, some models that have been put forward to explain the characteristics of a photovoltaic solar cell device under solar spot-illumination are investigated. In the experimental procedure, small areas of the cell were selected and illuminated at different solar intensities. The solar cell open circuit voltage (V oc ) and short circuit current (I sc ) obtained at different illumination intensities was used to determine the solar cell ideality factor. By varying the illuminated area on the solar cell, changes in the ideality factor were studied. The ideality factor obtained increases with decreasing illumination surface ratio. The photo-generated current at the illuminated part of the cell is assumed to act as a dc source that injects charge carriers into the p-n junction of the whole solar cell while the dark region of the solar cell operates in a low space charge recombination regime with small diffusion currents. From this analysis, a different model of a spot illuminated cell that uses the variation of ideality factor with the illuminated area is proposed.

All-Weather Solar Cells: A Rising Photovoltaic Revolution.

Science.gov (United States)

Tang, Qunwei

2017-06-16

Solar cells have been considered as one of the foremost solutions to energy and environmental problems because of clean, high efficiency, cost-effective, and inexhaustible features. The historical development and state-of-the-art solar cells mainly focus on elevating photoelectric conversion efficiency upon direct sunlight illumination. It is still a challenging problem to realize persistent high-efficiency power generation in rainy, foggy, haze, and dark-light conditions (night). The physical proof-of-concept for all-weather solar cells opens a door for an upcoming photovoltaic revolution. Our group has been exploring constructive routes to build all-weather solar cells so that these advanced photovoltaic technologies can be an indication for global solar industry in bringing down the cost of energy harvesting. How the all-weather solar cells are built without reducing photo performances and why such architectures can realize electricity outputs with no visible-light are discussed. Potential pathways and opportunities to enrich all-weather solar cell families are envisaged. The aspects discussed here may enable researchers to develop undiscovered abilities and to explore wide applications of advanced photovoltaics. © 2017 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

A distributed big data storage and data mining framework for solar-generated electricity quantity forecasting

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Jianzong; Chen, Yanjun; Hua, Rui; Wang, Peng; Fu, Jia

2012-02-01

Photovoltaic is a method of generating electrical power by converting solar radiation into direct current electricity using semiconductors that exhibit the photovoltaic effect. Photovoltaic power generation employs solar panels composed of a number of solar cells containing a photovoltaic material. Due to the growing demand for renewable energy sources, the manufacturing of solar cells and photovoltaic arrays has advanced considerably in recent years. Solar photovoltaics are growing rapidly, albeit from a small base, to a total global capacity of 40,000 MW at the end of 2010. More than 100 countries use solar photovoltaics. Driven by advances in technology and increases in manufacturing scale and sophistication, the cost of photovoltaic has declined steadily since the first solar cells were manufactured. Net metering and financial incentives, such as preferential feed-in tariffs for solar-generated electricity; have supported solar photovoltaics installations in many countries. However, the power that generated by solar photovoltaics is affected by the weather and other natural factors dramatically. To predict the photovoltaic energy accurately is of importance for the entire power intelligent dispatch in order to reduce the energy dissipation and maintain the security of power grid. In this paper, we have proposed a big data system--the Solar Photovoltaic Power Forecasting System, called SPPFS to calculate and predict the power according the real-time conditions. In this system, we utilized the distributed mixed database to speed up the rate of collecting, storing and analysis the meteorological data. In order to improve the accuracy of power prediction, the given neural network algorithm has been imported into SPPFS.By adopting abundant experiments, we shows that the framework can provide higher forecast accuracy-error rate less than 15% and obtain low latency of computing by deploying the mixed distributed database architecture for solar-generated electricity.

Solar-hydrogen generation and solar concentration (Conference Presentation)

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Sulima, Oleg V.; Chinello, Enrico; Conibeer, Gavin; Modestino, Miquel A.; Schüttauf, Jan-Willem; Lambelet, David; Delfino, Antonio; Domine, Didier; Faes, Antonin; Despeisse, Matthieu; Bailat, Julien; Psaltis, Demetri; Fernandez Rivas, David; Ballif, Christophe; Moser, Christophe

2016-01-01

We successfully demonstrated and reported the highest solar-to-hydrogen efficiency with crystalline silicon cells and Earth-abundant electrocatalysts under unconcentrated solar radiation. The combination of hetero-junction silicon cells and a 3D printed Platinum/Iridium-Oxide electrolyzer has been

Coupling of Luminescent Solar Concentrators to Plasmonic Solar Cells

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Shu-Yi

absorption at the emission peak of the dye. A factorial increase in the output power density of coupled PV as compared to PV exposed directly to solar spectrum is observed for high light concentration on the edge. These initial results motivated a more in-depth study of coupled LSC-PV system, which took into account the radiative transport inside the realistic LSC. These investigations were carried out on LSCs using Lumogen Red305 and Rhodamine 6G dyes coupled to pristine and plasmonic ultra-thin film silicon solar cells. Prediction based on detailed balance shows that the coupled LSC-plasmonic solar cell can generate 63.7 mW/cm2 with a photocurrent density of 71.3 mA/cm2 which is higher than that of cSi solar cells available on current market. The second part of the thesis focuses on PV absorption enhancement techniques. First, the effect of vertical positioning of plasmonic nanostructures on absorption enhancement was theoretically investigated to understand which one of the three mechanisms usually responsible for the enhancement (forward scattering, diffraction and localized surface plamson) plays the dominant role. Simulation results suggested that the maximum enhancement occurred when placing the nanostructures in the rear side of the cell because of longer path length due to scattering. The experimental effort then switched focus on substrate patterning, which is a less expensive alternative to plasmonic absorption enhancement. Specifically, a nanostructured substrate was prepared by a simple electrochemical process based on two-step aluminum anodization technique. The absorption of thin film silicon deposited on these substrates showed a broadband enhancement. The overall photocurrent density was up to 40% higher than that of films deposited on flat substrates. In conclusion, the studies carried out in this thesis indicate that spectral coupling of LSCs to thin film solar cells could lead to significant improvements in PV output power density. Moreover, while the

Solar Fuel Generator

Science.gov (United States)

Lewis, Nathan S. (Inventor); West, William C. (Inventor)

2017-01-01

The disclosure provides conductive membranes for water splitting and solar fuel generation. The membranes comprise an embedded semiconductive/photoactive material and an oxygen or hydrogen evolution catalyst. Also provided are chassis and cassettes containing the membranes for use in fuel generation.

Stability Issues on Perovskite Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Xing Zhao

2015-11-01

Full Text Available Organo lead halide perovskite materials like methylammonium lead iodide (CH3NH3PbI3 and formamidinium lead iodide (HC(NH22PbI3 show superb opto-electronic properties. Based on these perovskite light absorbers, power conversion efficiencies of the perovskite solar cells employing hole transporting layers have increased from 9.7% to 20.1% within just three years. Thus, it is apparent that perovskite solar cell is a promising next generation photovoltaic technology. However, the unstable nature of perovskite was observed when exposing it to continuous illumination, moisture and high temperature, impeding the commercial development in the long run and thus becoming the main issue that needs to be solved urgently. Here, we discuss the factors affecting instability of perovskite and give some perspectives about further enhancement of stability of perovskite solar cell.

High-performance flat-panel solar thermoelectric generators with high thermal concentration

Science.gov (United States)

Kraemer, Daniel; Poudel, Bed; Feng, Hsien-Ping; Caylor, J. Christopher; Yu, Bo; Yan, Xiao; Ma, Yi; Wang, Xiaowei; Wang, Dezhi; Muto, Andrew; McEnaney, Kenneth; Chiesa, Matteo; Ren, Zhifeng; Chen, Gang

2011-07-01

The conversion of sunlight into electricity has been dominated by photovoltaic and solar thermal power generation. Photovoltaic cells are deployed widely, mostly as flat panels, whereas solar thermal electricity generation relying on optical concentrators and mechanical heat engines is only seen in large-scale power plants. Here we demonstrate a promising flat-panel solar thermal to electric power conversion technology based on the Seebeck effect and high thermal concentration, thus enabling wider applications. The developed solar thermoelectric generators (STEGs) achieved a peak efficiency of 4.6% under AM1.5G (1 kW m-2) conditions. The efficiency is 7-8 times higher than the previously reported best value for a flat-panel STEG, and is enabled by the use of high-performance nanostructured thermoelectric materials and spectrally-selective solar absorbers in an innovative design that exploits high thermal concentration in an evacuated environment. Our work opens up a promising new approach which has the potential to achieve cost-effective conversion of solar energy into electricity.

High-performance flat-panel solar thermoelectric generators with high thermal concentration.

Science.gov (United States)

Kraemer, Daniel; Poudel, Bed; Feng, Hsien-Ping; Caylor, J Christopher; Yu, Bo; Yan, Xiao; Ma, Yi; Wang, Xiaowei; Wang, Dezhi; Muto, Andrew; McEnaney, Kenneth; Chiesa, Matteo; Ren, Zhifeng; Chen, Gang

2011-05-01

The conversion of sunlight into electricity has been dominated by photovoltaic and solar thermal power generation. Photovoltaic cells are deployed widely, mostly as flat panels, whereas solar thermal electricity generation relying on optical concentrators and mechanical heat engines is only seen in large-scale power plants. Here we demonstrate a promising flat-panel solar thermal to electric power conversion technology based on the Seebeck effect and high thermal concentration, thus enabling wider applications. The developed solar thermoelectric generators (STEGs) achieved a peak efficiency of 4.6% under AM1.5G (1 kW m(-2)) conditions. The efficiency is 7-8 times higher than the previously reported best value for a flat-panel STEG, and is enabled by the use of high-performance nanostructured thermoelectric materials and spectrally-selective solar absorbers in an innovative design that exploits high thermal concentration in an evacuated environment. Our work opens up a promising new approach which has the potential to achieve cost-effective conversion of solar energy into electricity. © 2011 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved

Constructal Optimization of Top Contact Metallization of a Photovoltaic Solar Cell

OpenAIRE

Bhakta, Aditya; Bandyopadhyay, Santanu

2010-01-01

A top contact metallization of a photovoltaic solar cell collects the current generated by incident solar radiation. Several power-loss mechanisms are associated with the current flow through the front contact grid. The design of the top metal contact grid is one of the most important areas of efficient photovoltaic solar cell design. In this paper, an approach based on the constructal theory is proposed to design the grid pattern in a photovoltaic solar cell, minimizing total resistive losse...

Design, engineering, and construction of photosynthetic microbial cell factories for renewable solar fuel production.

Science.gov (United States)

Lindblad, Peter; Lindberg, Pia; Oliveira, Paulo; Stensjö, Karin; Heidorn, Thorsten

2012-01-01

There is an urgent need to develop sustainable solutions to convert solar energy into energy carriers used in the society. In addition to solar cells generating electricity, there are several options to generate solar fuels. This paper outlines and discusses the design and engineering of photosynthetic microbial systems for the generation of renewable solar fuels, with a focus on cyanobacteria. Cyanobacteria are prokaryotic microorganisms with the same type of photosynthesis as higher plants. Native and engineered cyanobacteria have been used by us and others as model systems to examine, demonstrate, and develop photobiological H(2) production. More recently, the production of carbon-containing solar fuels like ethanol, butanol, and isoprene have been demonstrated. We are using a synthetic biology approach to develop efficient photosynthetic microbial cell factories for direct generation of biofuels from solar energy. Present progress and advances in the design, engineering, and construction of such cyanobacterial cells for the generation of a portfolio of solar fuels, e.g., hydrogen, alcohols, and isoprene, are presented and discussed. Possibilities and challenges when introducing and using synthetic biology are highlighted.

Design, Engineering, and Construction of Photosynthetic Microbial Cell Factories for Renewable Solar Fuel Production

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Lindblad, Peter; Lindberg, Pia; Stensjoe, Karin (Photochemistry and Molecular Science, Dept. of Chemistry-Aangstroem Laboratory, Uppsala Univ., Uppsala (Sweden)), E-mail: Peter.Lindblad@kemi.uu.se; Oliveira, Paulo (Instituto de Biologia Molecular e Celular, Porto (Portugal)); Heidorn, Thorsten (Bioforsk-Norwegian Inst. for Agricultural and Environmental Research, Aas Oslo, (Norway))

2012-03-15

There is an urgent need to develop sustainable solutions to convert solar energy into energy carriers used in the society. In addition to solar cells generating electricity, there are several options to generate solar fuels. This paper outlines and discusses the design and engineering of photosynthetic microbial systems for the generation of renewable solar fuels, with a focus on cyanobacteria. Cyanobacteria are prokaryotic microorganisms with the same type of photosynthesis as higher plants. Native and engineered cyanobacteria have been used by us and others as model systems to examine, demonstrate, and develop photobiological H{sub 2} production. More recently, the production of carbon-containing solar fuels like ethanol, butanol, and isoprene have been demonstrated. We are using a synthetic biology approach to develop efficient photosynthetic microbial cell factories for direct generation of biofuels from solar energy. Present progress and advances in the design, engineering, and construction of such cyanobacterial cells for the generation of a portfolio of solar fuels, e.g., hydrogen, alcohols, and isoprene, are presented and discussed. Possibilities and challenges when introducing and using synthetic biology are highlighted

Solar Photovoltaic Cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Mickey, Charles D.

1981-01-01

Reviews information on solar radiation as an energy source. Discusses these topics: the key photovoltaic material; the bank theory of solids; conductors, semiconductors, and insulators; impurity semiconductors; solid-state photovoltaic cell operation; limitations on solar cell efficiency; silicon solar cells; cadmium sulfide/copper (I) sulfide…

BM Solar Cells

KAUST Repository

Firdaus, Yuliar

2018-05-02

Fullerene‐based materials are widely used as electron acceptors in organic bulk‐heterojunction solar cells; yet, they have rarely been used as the only photoactive component due to their low absorbance and limited charge generation efficiency. However, blending the wide‐bandgap p‐type material copper (I) thiocyanate (CuSCN) with [6,6]‐phenyl‐C71‐butyric acid methyl ester (PC70BM) leads to the formation of a unique mesostructured p‐n like heterointerface between CuSCN and PC70BM and solar cells with a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of up to 5.4%. Here, we examine in detail the reasons for the surprisingly good device performance and elucidate the charge photogeneration and recombination mechanisms in CuSCN‐based devices with PC70BM as the exclusive light‐absorbing material. Our studies clearly demonstrate that a substantial fraction of the photocurrent in the CuSCN‐based devices results from improved dissociation of fullerene excitons and efficient charge transfer at the CuSCN:PC70BM interface combined with reduced geminate and nongeminate charge recombination losses. Our results have implications beyond the fullerene‐based devices studied here, as they demonstrate that careful selection of a mesostructured p‐type transparent semiconductor paves the path to a new type of efficient single photoactive material solar cells.

BM Solar Cells

KAUST Repository

Firdaus, Yuliar; Seitkhan, Akmaral; Eisner, Flurin; Sit, Wai-Yu; Kan, Zhipeng; Wehbe, Nimer; Balawi, Ahmed H.; Yengel, Emre; Karuthedath, Safakath; Laquai, Fré dé ric; Anthopoulos, Thomas D.

2018-01-01

Fullerene‐based materials are widely used as electron acceptors in organic bulk‐heterojunction solar cells; yet, they have rarely been used as the only photoactive component due to their low absorbance and limited charge generation efficiency. However, blending the wide‐bandgap p‐type material copper (I) thiocyanate (CuSCN) with [6,6]‐phenyl‐C71‐butyric acid methyl ester (PC70BM) leads to the formation of a unique mesostructured p‐n like heterointerface between CuSCN and PC70BM and solar cells with a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of up to 5.4%. Here, we examine in detail the reasons for the surprisingly good device performance and elucidate the charge photogeneration and recombination mechanisms in CuSCN‐based devices with PC70BM as the exclusive light‐absorbing material. Our studies clearly demonstrate that a substantial fraction of the photocurrent in the CuSCN‐based devices results from improved dissociation of fullerene excitons and efficient charge transfer at the CuSCN:PC70BM interface combined with reduced geminate and nongeminate charge recombination losses. Our results have implications beyond the fullerene‐based devices studied here, as they demonstrate that careful selection of a mesostructured p‐type transparent semiconductor paves the path to a new type of efficient single photoactive material solar cells.

Hydrogen passivation of multi-crystalline silicon solar cells

Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

胡志华; 廖显伯; 刘祖明; 夏朝凤; 陈庭金

2003-01-01

The effects of hydrogen passivation on multi-crystalline silicon (mc-Si) solar cells are reported in this paper.Hydrogen plasma was generated by means of ac glow discharge in a hydrogen atmosphere. Hydrogen passivation was carried out with three different groups of mc-Si solar cells after finishing contacts. The experimental results demonstrated that the photovoltaic performances of the solar cell samples have been improved after hydrogen plasma treatment, with a relative increase in conversion efficiency up to 10.6%. A calculation modelling has been performed to interpret the experimental results using the model for analysis of microelectronic and photonic structures developed at Pennsylvania State University.

Laminated photovoltaic modules using back-contact solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Gee, James M.; Garrett, Stephen E.; Morgan, William P.; Worobey, Walter

1999-09-14

Photovoltaic modules which comprise back-contact solar cells, such as back-contact crystalline silicon solar cells, positioned atop electrically conductive circuit elements affixed to a planar support so that a circuit capable of generating electric power is created. The modules are encapsulated using encapsulant materials such as EVA which are commonly used in photovoltaic module manufacture. The module designs allow multiple cells to be electrically connected in a single encapsulation step rather than by sequential soldering which characterizes the currently used commercial practices.

Photovoltaic Solar Energy Generation

CERN Document Server

Lotsch, H.K.V; U.Hoffmann, Volker; Rhodes, William T; Asakura, Toshimitsu; Brenner, Karl-Heinz; Hänsch, Theodor W; Kamiya, Takeshi; Krausz, Ferenc; Monemar, Bo; Venghaus, Herbert; Weber, Horst; Weinfurter, Harald

2005-01-01

This comprehensive description and discussion of photovoltaics (PV) is presented at a level that makes it accessible to the interested academic. Starting with an historical overview, the text outlines the relevance of photovoltaics today and in the future. Then follows an introduction to the physical background of solar cells and the most important materials and technologies, with particular emphasis placed on future developments and prospects. The book goes beyond technology by also describing the path from the cell to the module to the system, proceeding to important applications, such as grid-connected and stand-alone systems. The composition and development of the markets and the role of PV in future energy systems are also considered. Finally, the discussion turns to the future structure of energy supplies, expected to comprise more distributed generation, and addresses synergies and competition from other carbon-free energy sources.

Multijunction Ultralight Solar Cells and Arrays, Phase II

Data.gov (United States)

National Aeronautics and Space Administration — There is a continuing need within NASA for solar cells and arrays with very high specific power densities (1000-5000 kW/kg) for generating power in a new generation...

Perovskite-Based Solar Cells: Materials, Methods, and Future Perspectives

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Di Zhou

2018-01-01

Full Text Available A novel all-solid-state, hybrid solar cell based on organic-inorganic metal halide perovskite (CH3NH3PbX3 materials has attracted great attention from the researchers all over the world and is considered to be one of the top 10 scientific breakthroughs in 2013. The perovskite materials can be used not only as light-absorbing layer, but also as an electron/hole transport layer due to the advantages of its high extinction coefficient, high charge mobility, long carrier lifetime, and long carrier diffusion distance. The photoelectric power conversion efficiency of the perovskite solar cells has increased from 3.8% in 2009 to 22.1% in 2016, making perovskite solar cells the best potential candidate for the new generation of solar cells to replace traditional silicon solar cells in the future. In this paper, we introduce the development and mechanism of perovskite solar cells, describe the specific function of each layer, and focus on the improvement in the function of such layers and its influence on the cell performance. Next, the synthesis methods of the perovskite light-absorbing layer and the performance characteristics are discussed. Finally, the challenges and prospects for the development of perovskite solar cells are also briefly presented.

Pairing of near-ultraviolet solar cells with electrochromic windows for smart management of the solar spectrum

Science.gov (United States)

Davy, Nicholas C.; Sezen-Edmonds, Melda; Gao, Jia; Lin, Xin; Liu, Amy; Yao, Nan; Kahn, Antoine; Loo, Yueh-Lin

2017-08-01

Current smart window technologies offer dynamic control of the optical transmission of the visible and near-infrared portions of the solar spectrum to reduce lighting, heating and cooling needs in buildings and to improve occupant comfort. Solar cells harvesting near-ultraviolet photons could satisfy the unmet need of powering such smart windows over the same spatial footprint without competing for visible or infrared photons, and without the same aesthetic and design constraints. Here, we report organic single-junction solar cells that selectively harvest near-ultraviolet photons, produce open-circuit voltages eclipsing 1.6 V and exhibit scalability in power generation, with active layers (10 cm2) substantially larger than those typical of demonstration organic solar cells (0.04-0.2 cm2). Integration of these solar cells with a low-cost, polymer-based electrochromic window enables intelligent management of the solar spectrum, with near-ultraviolet photons powering the regulation of visible and near-infrared photons for natural lighting and heating purposes.

Radiation hardened high efficiency silicon space solar cell

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Garboushian, V.; Yoon, S.; Turner, J.

1993-01-01

A silicon solar cell with AMO 19% Beginning of Life (BOL) efficiency is reported. The cell has demonstrated equal or better radiation resistance when compared to conventional silicon space solar cells. Conventional silicon space solar cell performance is generally ∼ 14% at BOL. The Radiation Hardened High Efficiency Silicon (RHHES) cell is thinned for high specific power (watts/kilogram). The RHHES space cell provides compatibility with automatic surface mounting technology. The cells can be easily combined to provide desired power levels and voltages. The RHHES space cell is more resistant to mechanical damage due to micrometeorites. Micro-meteorites which impinge upon conventional cells can crack the cell which, in turn, may cause string failure. The RHHES, operating in the same environment, can continue to function with a similar crack. The RHHES cell allows for very efficient thermal management which is essential for space cells generating higher specific power levels. The cell eliminates the need for electrical insulation layers which would otherwise increase the thermal resistance for conventional space panels. The RHHES cell can be applied to a space concentrator panel system without abandoning any of the attributes discussed. The power handling capability of the RHHES cell is approximately five times more than conventional space concentrator solar cells

Use of solar cell in electrokinetic remediation of cadmium-contaminated soil.

Science.gov (United States)

Yuan, Songhu; Zheng, Zhonghua; Chen, Jing; Lu, Xiaohua

2009-03-15

This preliminary study used a solar cell, instead of direct current (DC) power supply, to generate electric field for electrokinetic (EK) remediation of cadmium-contaminated soil. Three EK tests were conducted and compared; one was conducted on a cloudy and rainy day with solar cell, one was conducted on a sunny day with solar cell and another was conducted periodically with DC power supply. It was found that the output potential of solar cell depended on daytime and was influenced by weather conditions; the applied potential in soil was affected by the output potential and weather conditions, and the current achieved by solar cell was comparable with that achieved by DC power supply. Solar cell could be used to drive the electromigration of cadmium in contaminated soil, and removal efficiency achieved by solar cell was comparable with that achieved by DC power supply. Compared with traditional DC power supply, using solar cell as power supply for EK remediation can greatly reduce energy expenditure. This study provided an alternative to improve the EK soil remediation and expanded the use of solar cell in environmental remediation.

Use of solar cell in electrokinetic remediation of cadmium-contaminated soil

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yuan Songhu; Zheng Zhonghua; Chen Jing; Lu Xiaohua

2009-01-01

This preliminary study used a solar cell, instead of direct current (DC) power supply, to generate electric field for electrokinetic (EK) remediation of cadmium-contaminated soil. Three EK tests were conducted and compared; one was conducted on a cloudy and rainy day with solar cell, one was conducted on a sunny day with solar cell and another was conducted periodically with DC power supply. It was found that the output potential of solar cell depended on daytime and was influenced by weather conditions; the applied potential in soil was affected by the output potential and weather conditions, and the current achieved by solar cell was comparable with that achieved by DC power supply. Solar cell could be used to drive the electromigration of cadmium in contaminated soil, and removal efficiency achieved by solar cell was comparable with that achieved by DC power supply. Compared with traditional DC power supply, using solar cell as power supply for EK remediation can greatly reduce energy expenditure. This study provided an alternative to improve the EK soil remediation and expanded the use of solar cell in environmental remediation

Integrated Front–Rear-Grid Optimization of Free-Form Solar Cells

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Gupta, D.K.; Barink, M.; Galagan, Y.; Langelaar, M.

2016-01-01

Free-form solar cells expand solar power beyond traditional rectangular geometries. With the flexibility of being installed on objects of daily use, they allow making better use of available space and are expected to bring in new possibilities of generating solar power in the coming future. In

Enhanced light absorption in an ultrathin silicon solar cell utilizing plasmonic nanostructures

Science.gov (United States)

Xiao, Sanshui; Mortensen, Niels A.

2012-10-01

Nowadays, bringing photovoltaics to the market is mainly limited by high cost of electricity produced by the photovoltaic solar cell. Thin-film photovoltaics offers the potential for a significant cost reduction compared to traditional photovoltaics. However, the performance of thin-film solar cells is generally limited by poor light absorption. We propose an ultrathin-film silicon solar cell configuration based on SOI structure, where the light absorption is enhanced by use of plasmonic nanostructures. By placing a one-dimensional plasmonic nanograting on the bottom of the solar cell, the generated photocurrent for a 200 nm-thickness crystalline silicon solar cell can be enhanced by 90% in the considered wavelength range. These results are paving a promising way for the realization of high-efficiency thin-film solar cells.

Above-CMOS a-Si and CIGS Solar Cells for Powering Autonomous Microsystems

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Lu, J.; Liu, W.; van der Werf, C.H.M.; Kovalgin, A.Y.; Sun, Y.; Schropp, R.E.I.; Schmitz, J.

2010-01-01

Two types of solar cells are successfully grown on chips from two CMOS generations. The efficiency of amorphous-silicon (a-Si) solar cells reaches 5.2%, copperindium-gallium-selenide (CIGS) cells 7.1%. CMOS functionality is unaffected. The main integration issues: adhesion, surface topography, metal

Internal transmission coefficient in charges carrier generation layer of graphene/Si based solar cell device

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Rosikhin, Ahmad; Winata, Toto

2016-01-01

Internal transmission profile in charges carrier generation layer of graphene/Si based solar cell has been explored theoretically. Photovoltaic device was constructed from graphene/Si heterojunction forming a multilayer stuck with Si as generation layer. The graphene/Si sheet was layered on ITO/glass wafer then coated by Al forming Ohmic contact with Si. Photon incident propagate from glass substrate to metal electrode and assumed that there is no transmission in Al layer. The wavelength range spectra used in this calculation was 200 – 1000 nm. It found that transmission intensity in the generation layer show non-linear behavior and partitioned by few areas which related with excitation process. According to this information, it may to optimize the photons absorption to create more excitation process by inserting appropriate material to enhance optical properties in certain wavelength spectra because of the exciton generation is strongly influenced by photon absorption.

Use of Advanced Solar Cells for Commercial Communication Satellites

Science.gov (United States)

Bailey, Sheila G.; Landis, Geoffrey A.

1995-01-01

The current generation of communications satellites are located primarily in geosynchronous Earth orbit (GEO). Over the next decade, however, a new generation of communications satellites will be built and launched, designed to provide a world-wide interconnection of portable telephones. For this mission, the satellites must be positioned in lower polar and near-polar orbits. To provide complete coverage, large numbers of satellites will be required. Because the required number of satellites decreases as the orbital altitude is increased, fewer satellites would be required if the orbit chosen were raised from low to intermediate orbit. However, in intermediate orbits, satellites encounter significant radiation due to trapped electrons and protons. Radiation tolerant solar cells may be necessary to make such satellites feasible. We analyze the amount of radiation encountered in low and intermediate polar orbits at altitudes of interest to next-generation communication satellites, calculate the expected degradation for silicon, GaAs, and InP solar cells, and show that the lifetimes can be significantly increased by use of advanced solar cells.

Research and development of evaluation system for photovoltaic power generation system. Survey on research and development of solar cell evaluation system; Taiyoko hatsuden system hyoka gijutsu no kenkyu kaihatsu. Taiyo denchi hyoka system no kenkyu kaihatsu chosa

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Tatsuta, M [New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization, Tokyo (Japan)

1994-12-01

This paper reports the survey results on R and D of solar cell evaluation systems in fiscal 1994. The performance/reliability evaluation subcommittee continuously analyzed technical issues and discussed solution measures from the last fiscal year. On development of performance evaluation methods, improvement of measurement accuracy for laminated solar cells is the study issue to be solved. Although laminated solar cells are measured by multiple light source solar simulator, difficult spectrum compensation causes measurement errors. Collection and analysis of data for determining atmospheric conditions, and outdoor measurement experiment under the atmospheric conditions for reference solar light were carried out. The study on incident angle characteristics of laminated solar cells clarified that the deviation from COS characteristics is 1.0% or less at an incident angle of 30{degree}. The study on generated energy in solar cell module level in field clarified that generated energy and generation efficiency are proportional to intensity of solar radiation. 1 tab.

Opto-electronic analysis of silicon solar cells by LBIC investigations and current-voltage characterization

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Thantsha, N.M.; Macabebe, E.Q.B.; Vorster, F.J.; Dyk, E.E. van

2009-01-01

A different laser beam induced current (LBIC) mapping technique has been used for the measurements of spatial variation of light generated current of a solar cell. These variations are caused by parasitic resistances and defects at grain boundaries (GBs) in multicrystalline silicon solar cells (mc-Si). This study investigates and identifies the regions within mc-Si solar cells where dominating recombination and lifetime limiting processes occur. A description of the LBIC technique is presented and the results show how multicrystalline GBs and other defects affect the light generated current of a spot illuminated mc-Si solar cell. The results of the internal quantum efficiency (IQE) at wavelength of 660 nm revealed that some regions in mc-Si solar cell give rise to paths that lead current away from the intended load.

Opto-electronic analysis of silicon solar cells by LBIC investigations and current-voltage characterization

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Thantsha, N.M.; Macabebe, E.Q.B.; Vorster, F.J. [Department of Physics, PO Box 77000, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Port Elizabeth 6031 (South Africa); Dyk, E.E. van, E-mail: ernest.vandyk@nmmu.ac.z [Department of Physics, PO Box 77000, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Port Elizabeth 6031 (South Africa)

2009-12-01

A different laser beam induced current (LBIC) mapping technique has been used for the measurements of spatial variation of light generated current of a solar cell. These variations are caused by parasitic resistances and defects at grain boundaries (GBs) in multicrystalline silicon solar cells (mc-Si). This study investigates and identifies the regions within mc-Si solar cells where dominating recombination and lifetime limiting processes occur. A description of the LBIC technique is presented and the results show how multicrystalline GBs and other defects affect the light generated current of a spot illuminated mc-Si solar cell. The results of the internal quantum efficiency (IQE) at wavelength of 660 nm revealed that some regions in mc-Si solar cell give rise to paths that lead current away from the intended load.

Diketopyrrolopyrrole Polymers for Organic Solar Cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Weiwei; Hendriks, Koen H; Wienk, Martijn M; Janssen, René A J

2016-01-19

fullerenes via solution processing. The width of these fibers and the photon energy loss, defined as the energy difference between optical band gap and open-circuit voltage, together govern to a large extent the quantum efficiency for charge generation in these blends and thereby the power conversion efficiency of the photovoltaic devices. Lowering the photon energy loss and maintaining a high quantum yield for charge generation is identified as a major pathway to enhance the performance of organic solar cells. This can be achieved by controlling the structural purity of the materials and further control over morphology formation. We hope that this Account contributes to improved design strategies of DPP polymers that are required to realize new breakthroughs in organic solar cell performance in the future.

Polymer materials for roll coated solar cells: strategies tom improve performance and stability

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Heckler, Ilona Maria

Solar cells are among the renewable energy technologies with a large potential in terms of solar energy availability. The solar cells based on conjugated polymers belong to the third generation of this technology and their attractive features include a fast and cheap solution‐processed production...

Thermochromic halide perovskite solar cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Lin, Jia; Lai, Minliang; Dou, Letian; Kley, Christopher S; Chen, Hong; Peng, Fei; Sun, Junliang; Lu, Dylan; Hawks, Steven A; Xie, Chenlu; Cui, Fan; Alivisatos, A Paul; Limmer, David T; Yang, Peidong

2018-03-01

Smart photovoltaic windows represent a promising green technology featuring tunable transparency and electrical power generation under external stimuli to control the light transmission and manage the solar energy. Here, we demonstrate a thermochromic solar cell for smart photovoltaic window applications utilizing the structural phase transitions in inorganic halide perovskite caesium lead iodide/bromide. The solar cells undergo thermally-driven, moisture-mediated reversible transitions between a transparent non-perovskite phase (81.7% visible transparency) with low power output and a deeply coloured perovskite phase (35.4% visible transparency) with high power output. The inorganic perovskites exhibit tunable colours and transparencies, a peak device efficiency above 7%, and a phase transition temperature as low as 105 °C. We demonstrate excellent device stability over repeated phase transition cycles without colour fade or performance degradation. The photovoltaic windows showing both photoactivity and thermochromic features represent key stepping-stones for integration with buildings, automobiles, information displays, and potentially many other technologies.

Thermochromic halide perovskite solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Lin, Jia; Lai, Minliang; Dou, Letian; Kley, Christopher S.; Chen, Hong; Peng, Fei; Sun, Junliang; Lu, Dylan; Hawks, Steven A.; Xie, Chenlu; Cui, Fan; Alivisatos, A. Paul; Limmer, David T.; Yang, Peidong

2018-03-01

Smart photovoltaic windows represent a promising green technology featuring tunable transparency and electrical power generation under external stimuli to control the light transmission and manage the solar energy. Here, we demonstrate a thermochromic solar cell for smart photovoltaic window applications utilizing the structural phase transitions in inorganic halide perovskite caesium lead iodide/bromide. The solar cells undergo thermally-driven, moisture-mediated reversible transitions between a transparent non-perovskite phase (81.7% visible transparency) with low power output and a deeply coloured perovskite phase (35.4% visible transparency) with high power output. The inorganic perovskites exhibit tunable colours and transparencies, a peak device efficiency above 7%, and a phase transition temperature as low as 105 °C. We demonstrate excellent device stability over repeated phase transition cycles without colour fade or performance degradation. The photovoltaic windows showing both photoactivity and thermochromic features represent key stepping-stones for integration with buildings, automobiles, information displays, and potentially many other technologies.

Radiation hardening of InP solar cells for space applications

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Vilela, M. F.; Freundlich, A.; Monier, C.; Newman, F.; Aguilar, L.

1998-01-01

The aim of this work is to develop a radiation resistant thin InP-based solar cells for space applications on more mechanically resistant, lighter, and cheaper substrates. In this paper, we present the development of a p + /nn + InP-based solar cell structures with very thin emitter and base layers. A thin emitter helps to increase the collection of carriers generated by high energy incident photons from the solar spectrum. The use of a thin n base structure should improve the radiation resistance of this already radiation resistant technology. A remarkable improvement of high energy photons response is shown for InP solar cells with emitters 400 A thick

Solar electron source and thermionic solar cell

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Parham Yaghoobi

2012-12-01

Full Text Available Common solar technologies are either photovoltaic/thermophotovoltaic, or use indirect methods of electricity generation such as boiling water for a steam turbine. Thermionic energy conversion based on the emission of electrons from a hot cathode into vacuum and their collection by an anode is also a promising route. However, thermionic solar conversion is extremely challenging as the sunlight intensity is too low for heating a conventional cathode to thermionic emission temperatures in a practical manner. Therefore, compared to other technologies, little has been done in this area, and the devices have been mainly limited to large experimental apparatus investigated for space power applications. Based on a recently observed “Heat Trap” effect in carbon nanotube arrays, allowing their efficient heating with low-power light, we report the first compact thermionic solar cell. Even using a simple off-the-shelf focusing lens, the device delivered over 1 V across a load. The device also shows intrinsic storage capacity.

Solar photovoltaic power generation system and understanding of green energy

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yoo, Chun Sik

2004-03-01

This book introduces sunlight generation system and green energy, which includes new and renewable energy such as photovoltaic power generation, solar thermal, wind power, bio energy, waste energy, geothermal energy, ocean energy and fuel cell photovoltaic industry like summary, technology trend, market trend, development strategy of the industry in Korea, and other countries, design of photovoltaic power generation system supporting policy and related business of new and renewable energy.

Photoeletrochemistry of metallo-octacarboxyphthalocyanines/multi-walled carbon nanotubes hybrid for development of dye solar cells

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Mphahlele, N

2013-04-01

Full Text Available Significant attention is being paid to dye solar cells (DSCs) as the next generation in solar cell technology for their low cost alternative to the currently implemented solid state solar cells [1]. In these devices, photosensitisers are one...

Spectral conversion for thin film solar cells and luminescent solar concentrators

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Sark, van W.G.J.H.M.; Wild, de J.; Krumer, Z.; Mello Donegá, de C.; Schropp, R.E.I.; Nozik, A.J.; Beard, M.C.; Conibeer, G.

2014-01-01

Full spectrum absorption combined with effective generation and collection of charge carriers is a prerequisite for attaining high efficiency solar cells. Two examples of spectral conversion are treated in this chapter, i.e., up-conversion and down-shifting. Up-conversion is applied to thin film

Henna (Lawsonia inermis L.) Dye-Sensitized Nanocrystalline Titania Solar Cell

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Jasim, Kh.E.; Al-Dallal, Sh.; Hassan, A.M.

2012-01-01

Low-cost solar cells have been the subject of intensive research activities for over half century ago. More recently, dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) emerged as a new class of low-cost solar cells that can be easily prepared. Natural-dye-sensitized solar cells (NDSSCs) are shown to be excellent examples of mimicking photosynthesis. The NDSSC acts as a green energy generator in which dyes molecules adsorbed to nanocrystalline layer of wide bandgap semiconductor material harvest photons. In this paper we investigate the structural, optical, electrical, and photovoltaic characterization of two types of natural dyes, namely, the Bahraini Henna and the Yemeni Henna, extracted using the Soxhlet extractor. Solar cells from both materials were prepared and characterized. It was found that the levels of open-circuit voltage and short-circuit current are concentration dependent. Further suggestions to improve the efficiency of NDSSC are discussed

Henna (Lawsonia inermis L. Dye-Sensitized Nanocrystalline Titania Solar Cell

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Khalil Ebrahim Jasim

2012-01-01

Full Text Available Low-cost solar cells have been the subject of intensive research activities for over half century ago. More recently, dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs emerged as a new class of low-cost solar cells that can be easily prepared. Natural-dye-sensitized solar cells (NDSSCs are shown to be excellent examples of mimicking photosynthesis. The NDSSC acts as a green energy generator in which dyes molecules adsorbed to nanocrystalline layer of wide bandgap semiconductor material harvest photons. In this paper we investigate the structural, optical, electrical, and photovoltaic characterization of two types of natural dyes, namely, the Bahraini Henna and the Yemeni Henna, extracted using the Soxhlet extractor. Solar cells from both materials were prepared and characterized. It was found that the levels of open-circuit voltage and short-circuit current are concentration dependent. Further suggestions to improve the efficiency of NDSSC are discussed.

Thin film solar cells: research in an industrial perspective.

Science.gov (United States)

Edoff, Marika

2012-01-01

Electricity generation by photovoltaic conversion of sunlight is a technology in strong growth. The thin film technology is taking market share from the dominant silicon wafer technology. In this article, the market for photovoltaics is reviewed, the concept of photovoltaic solar energy conversion is discussed and more details are given about the present technological limitations of thin film solar cell technology. Special emphasis is given for solar cells which employ Cu(In,Ga)Se(2) and Cu(2)ZnSn(S,Se)(4) as the sunlight-absorbing layer.

Nanocrystal Solar Cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Gur, Ilan [Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States)

2006-01-01

This dissertation presents the results of a research agenda aimed at improving integration and stability in nanocrystal-based solar cells through advances in active materials and device architectures. The introduction of 3-dimensional nanocrystals illustrates the potential for improving transport and percolation in hybrid solar cells and enables novel fabrication methods for optimizing integration in these systems. Fabricating cells by sequential deposition allows for solution-based assembly of hybrid composites with controlled and well-characterized dispersion and electrode contact. Hyperbranched nanocrystals emerge as a nearly ideal building block for hybrid cells, allowing the controlled morphologies targeted by templated approaches to be achieved in an easily fabricated solution-cast device. In addition to offering practical benefits to device processing, these approaches offer fundamental insight into the operation of hybrid solar cells, shedding light on key phenomena such as the roles of electrode-contact and percolation behavior in these cells. Finally, all-inorganic nanocrystal solar cells are presented as a wholly new cell concept, illustrating that donor-acceptor charge transfer and directed carrier diffusion can be utilized in a system with no organic components, and that nanocrystals may act as building blocks for efficient, stable, and low-cost thin-film solar cells.

Fiscal 1976 Sunshine Project result report. Research on solar energy utilization systems (photovoltaic power generation); 1976 nendo taiyo energy riyo system chosa kenkyu seika hokokusho. Taiyoko hatsuden

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

1977-03-01

This report describes the fiscal 1976 research result on the technical and economical perspectives of various solar cells, high-efficiency solar cell and its evaluation technique, and a photovoltaic power generation system and its applications. On Si single-crystal slice solar cell, it was pointed out that cost reduction by automatic production process using no vacuum process is essential. On Si thin film solar cell, some problems to be solved for development of particle accelerating growth technique were pointed out. Study was also made on 2-6 group compound semiconductor solar cell, 3-5 group bulk crystal solar cell, 3-5 group thin film solar cell, solar collection solar cell, and raw polycrystal Si materials. On photovoltaic power generation systems, it was reconfirmed through reconsideration of power generation systems for every application that the photovoltaic power generation system for residences is promising. On medium- scale power generation systems, study was made on power load and system configuration in consideration of applications to electric railway, highway, and power source of isolated islands. (NEDO)

Evolutionary process development towards next generation crystalline silicon solar cells : a semiconductor process toolbox application

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tous L.

2012-08-01

Full Text Available Bulk crystalline Silicon solar cells are covering more than 85% of the world’s roof top module installation in 2010. With a growth rate of over 30% in the last 10 years this technology remains the working horse of solar cell industry. The full Aluminum back-side field (Al BSF technology has been developed in the 90’s and provides a production learning curve on module price of constant 20% in average. The main reason for the decrease of module prices with increasing production capacity is due to the effect of up scaling industrial production. For further decreasing of the price per wattpeak silicon consumption has to be reduced and efficiency has to be improved. In this paper we describe a successive efficiency improving process development starting from the existing full Al BSF cell concept. We propose an evolutionary development includes all parts of the solar cell process: optical enhancement (texturing, polishing, anti-reflection coating, junction formation and contacting. Novel processes are benchmarked on industrial like baseline flows using high-efficiency cell concepts like i-PERC (Passivated Emitter and Rear Cell. While the full Al BSF crystalline silicon solar cell technology provides efficiencies of up to 18% (on cz-Si in production, we are achieving up to 19.4% conversion efficiency for industrial fabricated, large area solar cells with copper based front side metallization and local Al BSF applying the semiconductor toolbox.

Integrated photoelectrochemical energy storage: solar hydrogen generation and supercapacitor.

Science.gov (United States)

Xia, Xinhui; Luo, Jingshan; Zeng, Zhiyuan; Guan, Cao; Zhang, Yongqi; Tu, Jiangping; Zhang, Hua; Fan, Hong Jin

2012-01-01

Current solar energy harvest and storage are so far realized by independent technologies (such as solar cell and batteries), by which only a fraction of solar energy is utilized. It is highly desirable to improve the utilization efficiency of solar energy. Here, we construct an integrated photoelectrochemical device with simultaneous supercapacitor and hydrogen evolution functions based on TiO(2)/transition metal hydroxides/oxides core/shell nanorod arrays. The feasibility of solar-driven pseudocapacitance is clearly demonstrated, and the charge/discharge is indicated by reversible color changes (photochromism). In such an integrated device, the photogenerated electrons are utilized for H(2) generation and holes for pseudocapacitive charging, so that both the reductive and oxidative energies are captured and converted. Specific capacitances of 482 F g(-1) at 0.5 A g(-1) and 287 F g(-1) at 1 A g(-1) are obtained with TiO(2)/Ni(OH)(2) nanorod arrays. This study provides a new research strategy for integrated pseudocapacitor and solar energy application.

Technology of solar cells of CuInSe-2

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gordillo, Gerardo; Rodriguez, Jairo A

1993-01-01

The energetic problem in the World is at the present time one of the topics of more interest; for that reason the study of the transformation of the solar energy in electric power, using photovoltaic devices, it is a field of great priority in the investigation. The direct conversion of the solar energy in electric power, using solar cells, it represents an interesting alternative to replace a fraction of the energy deficit that will present as consequence of the limited reservations of hydrocarbons. At the present time they are had in experimentation plants lots of megawatts based on cells of silicon mono-crystalline. The solar cell technologically more developed it is that of silicon mono-crystalline; however their production cost is too high and difficultly it could compete economically with the traditional forms of generating energy; for this reason they are becoming big efforts and economic investments to develop solar cells of high efficiency and stability with base in thin movies whose production costs are much lower compared with those of cells of crystalline silicon

Nanocluster production for solar cell applications

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Al Dosari, Haila M.; Ayesh, Ahmad I.

2013-01-01

This research focuses on the fabrication and characterization of silver (Ag) and silicon (Si) nanoclusters that might be used for solar cell applications. Silver and silicon nanoclusters have been synthesized by means of dc magnetron sputtering and inert gas condensation inside an ultra-high vacuum compatible system. We have found that nanocluster size distributions can be tuned by various source parameters, such as the sputtering discharge power, flow rate of argon inert gas, and aggregation length. Quadrupole mass filter and transmission electron microscopy were used to evaluate the size distribution of Ag and Si nanoclusters. Ag nanoclusters with average size in the range of 3.6–8.3 nm were synthesized (herein size refers to the nanocluster diameter), whereas Si nanoclusters' average size was controlled to range between 2.9 and 7.4 nm by controlling the source parameters. This work illustrates the ability of controlling the Si and Ag nanoclusters' sizes by proper optimization of the operation conditions. By controlling nanoclusters' sizes, one can alter their surface properties to suit the need to enhance solar cell efficiency. Herein, Ag nanoclusters were deposited on commercial polycrystalline solar cells. Short circuit current (I SC ), open circuit voltage (V OC ), fill factor, and efficiency (η) were obtained under light source with an intensity of 30 mW/cm 2 . A 22.7% enhancement in solar cell efficiency could be measured after deposition of Ag nanoclusters, which demonstrates that Ag nanoclusters generated in this work are useful to enhance solar cell efficiency

Investigation of back surface fields effect on bifacial solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Sepeai, Suhaila; Sulaiman, M. Y.; Sopian, Kamaruzzaman; Zaidi, Saleem H.

2012-11-01

A bifacial solar cell, in contrast with a conventional monofacial solar cell, produces photo-generated current from both front and back sides. Bifacial solar cell is an attractive candidate for enhancing photovoltaic (PV) market competitiveness as well as supporting the current efforts to increase efficiency and lower material costs. This paper reports on the fabrication of bifacial solar cells using phosphorus-oxytrichloride (POCl3) emitter formation on p-type, nanotextured silicon (Si) wafer. Backside surface field was formed through Al-diffusion using conventional screen-printing process. Bifacial solar cells with a structure of n+pp+ with and without back surface field (BSF) were fabricated in which silicon nitride (SiN) anti reflection and passivation films were coated on both sides, followed by screen printing of Argentum (Ag) and Argentum/Aluminum (Ag/Al) on front and back contacts, respectively. Bifacial solar cells without BSF exhibited open circuit voltage (VOC) of 535 mV for front and 480 mV for back surface. With Al-alloyed BSF bifacial solar cells, the VOC improved to 580 mV for the front surface and 560 mV for the back surface. Simulation of bifacial solar cells using PC1D and AFORS software demonstrated good agreement with experimental results. Simulations showed that best bifacial solar cells are achieved through a combination of high lifetime wafer, low recombination back surface field, reduced contact resistance, and superior surface passivation.

Organic thin-film solar cells: next generation low-cost photovoltaic ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

The growing concern about our environment and sustainable development focuses attention on renewable energy sources. One of these sources is the direct conversion of sunlight into electricity by means of photovoltaic cells. Solar energy has the potential to fulfil an important part of the sustainable energy demand for ...

Fabrication Processes to Generate Concentration Gradients in Polymer Solar Cell Active Layers

Science.gov (United States)

Inaba, Shusei; Vohra, Varun

2017-01-01

Polymer solar cells (PSCs) are considered as one of the most promising low-cost alternatives for renewable energy production with devices now reaching power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) above the milestone value of 10%. These enhanced performances were achieved by developing new electron-donor (ED) and electron-acceptor (EA) materials as well as finding the adequate morphologies in either bulk heterojunction or sequentially deposited active layers. In particular, producing adequate vertical concentration gradients with higher concentrations of ED and EA close to the anode and cathode, respectively, results in an improved charge collection and consequently higher photovoltaic parameters such as the fill factor. In this review, we relate processes to generate active layers with ED–EA vertical concentration gradients. After summarizing the formation of such concentration gradients in single layer active layers through processes such as annealing or additives, we will verify that sequential deposition of multilayered active layers can be an efficient approach to remarkably increase the fill factor and PCE of PSCs. In fact, applying this challenging approach to fabricate inverted architecture PSCs has the potential to generate low-cost, high efficiency and stable devices, which may revolutionize worldwide energy demand and/or help develop next generation devices such as semi-transparent photovoltaic windows. PMID:28772878

Dielectric nanostructures for broadband light trapping in organic solar cells

KAUST Repository

Raman, Aaswath

2011-09-15

Organic bulk heterojunction solar cells are a promising candidate for low-cost next-generation photovoltaic systems. However, carrier extraction limitations necessitate thin active layers that sacrifice absorption for internal quantum efficiency or vice versa. Motivated by recent theoretical developments, we show that dielectric wavelength-scale grating structures can produce significant absorption resonances in a realistic organic cell architecture. We numerically demonstrate that 1D, 2D and multi-level ITO-air gratings lying on top of the organic solar cell stack produce a 8-15% increase in photocurrent for a model organic solar cell where PCDTBT:PC71BM is the organic semiconductor. Specific to this approach, the active layer itself remains untouched yet receives the benefit of light trapping by nanostructuring the top surface below which it lies. The techniques developed here are broadly applicable to organic semiconductors in general, and enable partial decoupling between active layer thickness and photocurrent generation. © 2011 Optical Society of America.

Novel Design for a Diffusive Solar Cell Window

OpenAIRE

Chen, Ruei-Tang; Kang, Chih-Chieh; Lin, Jeng-Feng; Chiou, Sheng-Wei; Cheng, Hung-Hsiang; Lai, Chih-Wen

2015-01-01

Building integrated photovoltaics (BIPV) are an important application of future solar energy development. The incorporation of solar cells into windows must not only maintain indoor natural lighting but also generate electrical power at the same time. In our continuing effort to improve the design of diffusion solar window, a more fundamental and efficient three-layer structure—glass/EVA with TiO2 nanoparticles embedded/glass—was proposed. In this work, a well-established ASAP ray-tracing mod...

Explore the performance limit of a solar PV – thermochemical power generation system

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Li, Wenjia; Hao, Yong

2017-01-01

Highlights: •Theoretical net solar-to-electric efficiency of 51.5% is attainable. •Design of efficient PVT systems is governed by at least 5 key considerations. •Concentration ratio has the most pronounced influence on PVT system efficiency. •Efficient PV, low emissivity and high concentration deliver the best performance. -- Abstract: Performance limit of a solar hybrid power generation system integrating efficient photovoltaic (PV) cells and methanol thermal (T) decomposition is explored from a thermodynamic perspective within the capability of state-of-the-art technologies. This type of PVT system features potentially high “net solar-to-electric efficiency” in general, primarily resulting from a key difference in the design of the thermal part compared with conventional PVT systems, i.e. replacing heat engines by a thermochemical power generation module for thermal energy utilization. Key design parameters of the system, including PV cell type, emissivity, solar concentration ratio and solar concentrator type, are individually studied. A system combining all such optimized aspects is projected to achieve net solar-to-electric efficiencies up to 51.5%, after taking all major (e.g. optical, radiative) losses into consideration. This study reveals important insights and enriches understanding on design principles of efficient PVT systems aimed at comprehensive and effective utilization of solar energy.

Forward Technology Solar Cell Experiment First On-Orbit Data

Science.gov (United States)

Walters, R. J.; Garner, J. C.; Lam, S. N.; Vazquez, J. A.; Braun, W. R.; Ruth, R. E.; Warner, J. H.; Lorentzen, J. R.; Messenger, S. R.; Bruninga, R.;

Comparative parameters of solar cells for power generation: test stand implementation using DSP

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Álvarez López, Ramón Antonio; García Angarita, Maritza Andrea

2014-01-01

The technologies used in solar modules are distinguished mainly by th eenergy conversion efficiency. Consequently, the module selection is critic to the long term performance of photovoltaic generating facility. Therefore, the selection must be supported by experimental results obtained under a specific operation condition. The article implements an experimentally test for obtain the characteristic parameters of a solar module, we analyze the energy conversion efficiency and other correlated parameters that directly affect the performance of a photovoltaic generator. The results show that the use of a rapid prototyping system using open hardware, such as TMS320F28335 development kit makes it easy to build a test photovoltaic generation systems. Latter justified by the low cost of such devices and ease of programming. (author)

Solar energy powered microbial fuel cell with a reversible bioelectrode

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Strik, D.P.B.T.B.; Hamelers, H.V.M.; Buisman, C.J.N.

2010-01-01

The solar energy powered microbial fuel cell is an emerging technology for electricity generation via electrochemically active microorganisms fueled by solar energy via in situ photosynthesized metabolites from algae, cyanobacteria, or living higher plants. A general problem with microbial fuel

International Conference on Solar Concentrators for the Generation of Electricity or Hydrogen: Book of Abstracts

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

McConnell, R.; Symko-Davies, M.; Hayden, H.

2005-05-01

The International Conference on Solar Concentrators for the Generation of Electricity or Hydrogen provides an opportunity to learn about current significant research on solar concentrators for generating electricity or hydrogen. The conference will emphasize in-depth technical discussions of recent achievements in technologies that convert concentrated solar radiation to electricity or hydrogen, with primary emphasis on photovoltaic (PV) technologies. Very high-efficiency solar cells--above 37%--were recently developed, and are now widely used for powering satellites. This development demands that we take a fresh look at the potential of solar concentrators for generating low-cost electricity or hydrogen. Solar electric concentrators could dramatically overtake other PV technologies in the electric utility marketplace because of the low capital cost of concentrator manufacturing facilities and the larger module size of concentrators. Concentrating solar energy also has advantages for th e solar generation of hydrogen. Around the world, researchers and engineers are developing solar concentrator technologies for entry into the electricity generation market and several have explored the use of concentrators for hydrogen production. The last conference on the subject of solar electric concentrators was held in November of 2003 and proved to be an important opportunity for researchers and developers to share new and crucial information that is helping to stimulate projects in their countries.

Charge Transfer from Carbon Nanotubes to Silicon in Flexible Carbon Nanotube/Silicon Solar Cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Xiaokai; Mariano, Marina; McMillon-Brown, Lyndsey; Huang, Jing-Shun; Sfeir, Matthew Y; Reed, Mark A; Jung, Yeonwoong; Taylor, André D

2017-12-01

Mechanical fragility and insufficient light absorption are two major challenges for thin flexible crystalline Si-based solar cells. Flexible hybrid single-walled carbon nanotube (SWNT)/Si solar cells are demonstrated by applying scalable room-temperature processes for the fabrication of solar-cell components (e.g., preparation of SWNT thin films and SWNT/Si p-n junctions). The flexible SWNT/Si solar cells present an intrinsic efficiency ≈7.5% without any additional light-trapping structures. By using these solar cells as model systems, the charge transport mechanisms at the SWNT/Si interface are investigated using femtosecond transient absorption. Although primary photon absorption occurs in Si, transient absorption measurements show that SWNTs also generate and inject excited charge carriers to Si. Such effects can be tuned by controlling the thickness of the SWNTs. Findings from this study could open a new pathway for designing and improving the efficiency of photocarrier generation and absorption for high-performance ultrathin hybrid SWNT/Si solar cells. © 2017 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Materials and Light Management for High-Efficiency Thin-Film Silicon Solar Cells

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Tan, H.

2015-01-01

Direct conversion of sunlight into electricity is one of the most promising approaches to provide sufficient renewable energy for humankind. Solar cells are such devices which can efficiently generate electricity from sunlight through the photovoltaic effect. Thin-film silicon solar cells, a type of

Quantum theory of operation for rectenna solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Grover, Sachit; Joshi, Saumil; Moddel, Garret

2013-01-01

Optical rectennas, sub-micrometre antenna-coupled diodes, can directly rectify solar and thermal electromagnetic radiation, and have been proposed as an alternative to conventional semiconductor photovoltaics. We develop a comprehensive description of the operating principle of rectenna solar cells. In prior work classical concepts from microwave rectenna theory have been applied to the analysis of photovoltaic power generation using these ultra-high frequency rectifiers. Because of their high photon energy the interaction of petahertz frequency waves with fast-responding diodes requires a semiclassical analysis. We use the theory of photon-assisted transport to derive the current–voltage [I(V)] characteristics of metal/insulator/metal tunnel diodes under illumination. We show how power is generated in the second quadrant of the I(V) characteristic, derive solar cell parameters, and analyse the key variables that influence the performance under monochromatic radiation and to a first order approximation. The efficiency improves with reduced dark current under reverse bias and increasing incident electromagnetic power. (paper)

Mushrooms as Efficient Solar Steam-Generation Devices.

Science.gov (United States)

Xu, Ning; Hu, Xiaozhen; Xu, Weichao; Li, Xiuqiang; Zhou, Lin; Zhu, Shining; Zhu, Jia

2017-07-01

Solar steam generation is emerging as a promising technology, for its potential in harvesting solar energy for various applications such as desalination and sterilization. Recent studies have reported a variety of artificial structures that are designed and fabricated to improve energy conversion efficiencies by enhancing solar absorption, heat localization, water supply, and vapor transportation. Mushrooms, as a kind of living organism, are surprisingly found to be efficient solar steam-generation devices for the first time. Natural and carbonized mushrooms can achieve ≈62% and ≈78% conversion efficiencies under 1 sun illumination, respectively. It is found that this capability of high solar steam generation is attributed to the unique natural structure of mushroom, umbrella-shaped black pileus, porous context, and fibrous stipe with a small cross section. These features not only provide efficient light absorption, water supply, and vapor escape, but also suppress three components of heat losses at the same time. These findings not only reveal the hidden talent of mushrooms as low-cost materials for solar steam generation, but also provide inspiration for the future development of high-performance solar thermal conversion devices. © 2017 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

The generation of pollution-free electrical power from solar energy.

Science.gov (United States)

Cherry, W. R.

1971-01-01

Projections of the U.S. electrical power demands over the next 30 years indicate that the U.S. could be in grave danger from power shortages, undesirable effluence, and thermal pollution. An appraisal of nonconventional methods of producing electrical power is conducted, giving particular attention to the conversion of solar energy into commercial quantities of electrical power by solar cells. It is found that 1% of the land area of the 48 states could provide the total electrical power requirements of the U.S. in the year 1990. The ultimate method of generating vast quantities of electrical power would be from a series of synchronous satellites which beam microwave power back to earth to be used wherever needed. Present high manufacturing costs of solar cells could be substantially reduced by using massive automated techniques employing abundant low cost materials.

Generalized detailed balance theory of solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kirchartz, Thomas

2009-12-12

compatible with the Shockley-Queisser limit and the classical diode theory. For organic solar cells, exciton binding energies are sufficiently high, so that purely bipolar models are no longer applicable. Instead, excitonic transport has to be included. Thus, the inclusion of exciton transport into the bipolar detailed balance model leads to a generalized detailed balance model that simulates solar cells with predominantly bipolar transport, with predominantly excitonic transport and with every combination of both. Due to low exciton diffusion lengths, organic solar cells are usually combined with a specific device geometry, the bulk heterojunction. In a bulk heterojunction device, the whole bulk of the absorber is made up of distributed heterojunctions, where the exciton is transferred to a bound pair at the interface, which is then split into free electron and hole. The assumption that exciton transport is only relevant towards the next heterointerface allows to develop also a version of the detailed balance model that is applicable to bulk heterojunction cells. The last variation of the detailed balance model includes the process of impact ionisation as a means to generate more than one exciton from a single high energy photon. The model for multiple exciton generating absorbers identifies possible bottlenecks as well as maximum efficiencies of future solar cells that use this concept. Another direct consequence of the principle of detailed balance is a reciprocity theorem between electroluminescence and solar cell quantum efficiency. The theoretical part of this thesis discusses the validity range of this reciprocity and checks for each version of the model, whether the relation between electroluminescence and quantum efficiency is still applicable. The main result shows that voltage dependent carrier collection as encountered in low mobility pin-junction devices leads to deviations from the reciprocity, while it still holds for most pn-junction solar cells. The

Solar cell. Taiyo denchi

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kamihara, T; Kondo, S; Mori, K [Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd., Osaka (Japan)

1990-10-23

This invention provides a solar cell having high resistance to strong incident light and high temperature preservability. Reason of performance degradation of the solar cell in high temperature atmosphere thermally diffuses at the boundary surface of the silicon with metal particles. The method of blocking this thermal diffusion is that the film thickness is of the level that the electrons can pass through the film by a quantum dynamical tunnel effect. In this invention, the construction is that a transparent substrate, a transparent electrode, a P-type amorphous silicon, an I-type amorphous silicon, silica and a collector electrode are sequentially laminated and receives the incident light, thus generating a voltage between the two electrodes. Thickness of silica film is 10-100 microns. Materials of the collector electrode are either single element or alloys of Cs, K, Na, Li, Ba, Mg, Cd, Ta, Al, Mo, Zr, Co, Fe, Cu, Ag, W, Cr, Au and Ni. 13 figs., 1 tab.

Inorganic p-Type Semiconductors: Their Applications and Progress in Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells and Perovskite Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ming-Hsien Li

2016-04-01

Full Text Available Considering the increasing global demand for energy and the harmful ecological impact of conventional energy sources, it is obvious that development of clean and renewable energy is a necessity. Since the Sun is our only external energy source, harnessing its energy, which is clean, non-hazardous and infinite, satisfies the main objectives of all alternative energy strategies. With attractive features, i.e., good performance, low-cost potential, simple processibility, a wide range of applications from portable power generation to power-windows, photoelectrochemical solar cells like dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs represent one of the promising methods for future large-scale power production directly from sunlight. While the sensitization of n-type semiconductors (n-SC has been intensively studied, the use of p-type semiconductor (p-SC, e.g., the sensitization of wide bandgap p-SC and hole transport materials with p-SC have also been attracting great attention. Recently, it has been proved that the p-type inorganic semiconductor as a charge selective material or a charge transport material in organometallic lead halide perovskite solar cells (PSCs shows a significant impact on solar cell performance. Therefore the study of p-type semiconductors is important to rationally design efficient DSCs and PSCs. In this review, recent published works on p-type DSCs and PSCs incorporated with an inorganic p-type semiconductor and our perspectives on this topic are discussed.

Nanophotonic light-trapping theory for solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Yu, Zongfu; Raman, Aaswath; Fan, Shanhui [Stanford University, Ginzton Lab, Stanford, CA (United States)

2011-11-15

Conventional light-trapping theory, based on a ray-optics approach, was developed for standard thick photovoltaic cells. The classical theory established an upper limit for possible absorption enhancement in this context and provided a design strategy for reaching this limit. This theory has become the foundation for light management in bulk silicon PV cells, and has had enormous influence on the optical design of solar cells in general. This theory, however, is not applicable in the nanophotonic regime. Here we develop a statistical temporal coupled-mode theory of light trapping based on a rigorous electromagnetic approach. Our theory reveals that the standard limit can be substantially surpassed when optical modes in the active layer are confined to deep-subwavelength scale, opening new avenues for highly efficient next-generation solar cells. (orig.)

Application of solar panels in vehicle parking under the concept of distributed generation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Calderon Vega, Jefferson

2013-01-01

An analysis of solar panels technologies is realized to implement an application of distributed generation in vehicle parking. The different technologies available in the market about solar panels are investigated. The climatological and geographical conditions are studied for the use of solar energy. The electrical requirements are determined for the implementation of solar panels as a distributed generation system. The benefit/cost is analyzed in establishments of vehicle parking for the implementation of solar panels. A photovoltaic system was developed in a vehicle parking attached at the Colegio Federado de Ingenieros y Arquitectos, and also the technical feasibility has been determined. The photovoltaic systems about roofs of buildings every day have been more viable, due that the cost of the systems has been lower and more efficient. Crystalline silicon ''mono'' or ''poly'' has been the most reliable option in the development of new technologies in solar cells. Costa Rica is found in a zone where the photovoltaic solar energy is harnessed and should to be fostered by the engineering sector. The installation of photovoltaic systems has contributed to reduce the carbon footprint in the distributed generation [es

Thin film solar cell technology in Germany

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Diehl, W.; Sittinger, V.; Szyszka, B.

2005-01-01

Within the scope of limited nonrenewable energy resources and the limited capacity of the ecosystem for greenhouse gases and nuclear waste, sustainability is one important target in the future. Different energy scenarios showed the huge potential for photovoltaics (PV) to solve this energy problem. Nevertheless, in the last decade, PV had an average growth rate of over 20% per year. In 2002, the solar industry delivered more than 500 MWp/year of photovoltaic generators [A. Jaeger-Waldau, A European Roadmap for PV R and D, E-MRS Spring Meeting, (2003)]. More than 85% of the current production involves crystalline silicon technologies. These technologies still have a high cost reduction potential, but this will be limited by the silicon feedstock. On the other hand the so-called second generation thin film solar cells based on a-Si, Cu(In,Ga)(Se,S 2 (CIGS) or CdTe have material thicknesses of a few microns as a result of their direct band gap. Also, the possibility of circuit integration offers an additional cost reduction potential. Especially in Germany, there are a few companies who focus on thin film solar cells. Today, there are two manufacturers with production lines: the Phototronics (PST) division of RWE-Schott Solar with a-Si thin film technology and the former Antec Solar GmbH (now Antec Solar Energy GmbH) featuring the CdTe technology. A pilot line based on CIGS technology is run by Wuerth Solar GmbH. There is also a variety of research activity at other companies, namely, at Shell Solar, Sulfurcell Solartechnik GmbH, Solarion GmbH and the CIS-Solartechnik GmbH. We will give an overview on research activity on various thin film technologies, as well as different manufacturing and production processes in the companies mentioned above. (Author)

Rectenna solar cells

CERN Document Server

Moddel, Garret

2013-01-01

Rectenna Solar Cells discusses antenna-coupled diode solar cells, an emerging technology that has the potential to provide ultra-high efficiency, low-cost solar energy conversion. This book will provide an overview of solar rectennas, and provide thorough descriptions of the two main components: the diode, and the optical antenna. The editors discuss the science, design, modeling, and manufacturing of the antennas coupled with the diodes. The book will provide concepts to understanding the challenges, fabrication technologies, and materials required to develop rectenna structures. Written by e

Localized surface plasmon resonance enhanced organic solar cell with gold nanospheres

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Qiao, Linfang; Wang, Dan; Ye, Yuqian; Qian, Jun; He, Sailing [Centre for Optical and Electromagnetic Research, State Key Laboratory of Modern Optical Instrumentation, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058 (China); Zuo, Lijian; Chen, Hongzheng [Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, State Key Lab of Silicon Materials, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027 (China)

2011-03-15

We use gold nanospheres (Au NSs) to improve the performance of polymer organic solar cells. Au NSs with a diameter of about 5 nm or 15 nm were doped into the buffer layer of organic solar cells. We attribute the efficiency improvement to the size-dependent localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) effect of Au NSs, which can enhance the light harvest ability of active layer around the Au NSs, and increase the probability of the exciton generation and dissociation. Our results show that solar cells doped with 15 nm-diameter Au NSs exhibit significant improvement of the efficiency (from 1.99% to 2.36%), while solar cells doped with only 5 nm-diameter Au NSs did not give obvious improvement of the performance. (author)

Integrated photoelectrochemical energy storage: solar hydrogen generation and supercapacitor

Science.gov (United States)

Xia, Xinhui; Luo, Jingshan; Zeng, Zhiyuan; Guan, Cao; Zhang, Yongqi; Tu, Jiangping; Zhang, Hua; Fan, Hong Jin

2012-01-01

Current solar energy harvest and storage are so far realized by independent technologies (such as solar cell and batteries), by which only a fraction of solar energy is utilized. It is highly desirable to improve the utilization efficiency of solar energy. Here, we construct an integrated photoelectrochemical device with simultaneous supercapacitor and hydrogen evolution functions based on TiO2/transition metal hydroxides/oxides core/shell nanorod arrays. The feasibility of solar-driven pseudocapacitance is clearly demonstrated, and the charge/discharge is indicated by reversible color changes (photochromism). In such an integrated device, the photogenerated electrons are utilized for H2 generation and holes for pseudocapacitive charging, so that both the reductive and oxidative energies are captured and converted. Specific capacitances of 482 F g−1 at 0.5 A g−1 and 287 F g−1 at 1 A g−1 are obtained with TiO2/Ni(OH)2 nanorod arrays. This study provides a new research strategy for integrated pseudocapacitor and solar energy application. PMID:23248745

Solar cell radiation handbook

Science.gov (United States)

Tada, H. Y.; Carter, J. R., Jr.; Anspaugh, B. E.; Downing, R. G.

1982-01-01

The handbook to predict the degradation of solar cell electrical performance in any given space radiation environment is presented. Solar cell theory, cell manufacturing and how they are modeled mathematically are described. The interaction of energetic charged particles radiation with solar cells is discussed and the concept of 1 MeV equivalent electron fluence is introduced. The space radiation environment is described and methods of calculating equivalent fluences for the space environment are developed. A computer program was written to perform the equivalent fluence calculations and a FORTRAN listing of the program is included. Data detailing the degradation of solar cell electrical parameters as a function of 1 MeV electron fluence are presented.

Recent Advances in Interface Engineering for Planar Heterojunction Perovskite Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Wei Yin

2016-06-01

Full Text Available Organic-inorganic hybrid perovskite solar cells are considered as one of the most promising next-generation solar cells due to their advantages of low-cost precursors, high power conversion efficiency (PCE and easy of processing. In the past few years, the PCEs have climbed from a few to over 20% for perovskite solar cells. Recent developments demonstrate that perovskite exhibits ambipolar semiconducting characteristics, which allows for the construction of planar heterojunction (PHJ perovskite solar cells. PHJ perovskite solar cells can avoid the use of high-temperature sintered mesoporous metal oxides, enabling simple processing and the fabrication of flexible and tandem perovskite solar cells. In planar heterojunction materials, hole/electron transport layers are introduced between a perovskite film and the anode/cathode. The hole and electron transporting layers are expected to enhance exciton separation, charge transportation and collection. Further, the supporting layer for the perovskite film not only plays an important role in energy-level alignment, but also affects perovskite film morphology, which have a great effect on device performance. In addition, interfacial layers also affect device stability. In this review, recent progress in interfacial engineering for PHJ perovskite solar cells will be reviewed, especially with the molecular interfacial materials. The supporting interfacial layers for the optimization of perovskite films will be systematically reviewed. Finally, the challenges remaining in perovskite solar cells research will be discussed.

Prospects to solar energy power generation in space. Uchu taiyo hatsuden eno tenbo

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kudo, I. (Electrotechnical Laboratory, Tsukuba (Japan))

1993-05-01

Solar energy power generation in space uses large arrays of solar cells developed on a geosynchronous orbit to obtain electric energy, which is transmitted to the earth using microwaves. The idea had already been advocated in 1968, which was followed a decade later by joint discussions done by NASA and DOE. The concept intended to take care of the U.S. power demand by using 60 power plant satellites, each having an output of 5 GW. This expanse of the scale, regarded reasonable even today, calls for the solar cell arrays in space spreading over an area of 10 km [times] 5 km if silicon solar cells with a conversion efficiency of 15% are used, and rectenna on the ground (a received wave converting facility) forming an ellipse of 10 km [times] 13 km (assuming a location at the north latitude of 36[degree]). Although there are a number of problems in the idea such as transportation means to lift construction materials into the space and effect of microwaves on the ionosphere and the ecosystems, the Agency of Industrial Science and Technology organized a 'committee for investigating and studying the space power generation systems' in the fiscal year 1991, and has been moving discussions forward since then. 7 refs., 5 figs.

Passive flow heat exchanger simulation for power generation from solar pond using thermoelectric generators

Science.gov (United States)

Baharin, Nuraida'Aadilia; Arzami, Amir Afiq; Singh, Baljit; Remeli, Muhammad Fairuz; Tan, Lippong; Oberoi, Amandeep

2017-04-01

In this study, a thermoelectric generator heat exchanger system was designed and simulated for electricity generation from solar pond. A thermoelectric generator heat exchanger was studied by using Computational Fluid Dynamics to simulate flow and heat transfer. A thermoelectric generator heat exchanger designed for passive in-pond flow used in solar pond for electrical power generation. A simple analysis simulation was developed to obtain the amount of electricity generated at different conditions for hot temperatures of a solar pond at different flow rates. Results indicated that the system is capable of producing electricity. This study and design provides an alternative way to generate electricity from solar pond in tropical countries like Malaysia for possible renewable energy applications.

Low-cost transparent solar cells: Potential of TiO2 nanotubes in the improvement of these next generation solar cells

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Cummings, F

2010-09-01

Full Text Available This paper provides a background to photovoltaics, and goes on to discuss dye-sensitised solar cell research and development at the CSIR. An overview of TiO2 nanotube synthesis is given, followed by the discussing the manufacturing process of dye...

How the relative permittivity of solar cell materials influences solar cell performance

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Crovetto, Andrea; Huss-Hansen, Mathias K.; Hansen, Ole

2017-01-01

of the materials permittivity on the physics and performance of the solar cell by means of numerical simulation supported by analytical relations. We demonstrate that, depending on the specific solar cell configuration and materials properties, there are scenarios where the relative permittivity has a major......The relative permittivity of the materials constituting heterojunction solar cells is usually not considered as a design parameter when searching for novel combinations of heterojunction materials. In this work, we investigate the validity of such an approach. Specifically, we show the effect...... the heterojunction partner has a high permittivity, solar cells are consistently more robust against several non-idealities that are especially likely to occur in early-stage development, when the device is not yet optimized....

Efficiency limit of solar cells with index-near-zero photon management layers

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kirk, A.P.

2017-05-15

As single-junction solar cells saturate in efficiency, the topic of photon management has generated interest in the long running quest to exceed the Shockley-Queisser efficiency limit. While a mirror applied to the backside of a solar cell has proven its benefit as a photon management layer in record setting devices that fall within the Shockley-Queisser limit, it has been proposed that a new type of photon management layer – a transparent index-near-zero (INZ) material – applied to the top surface of a solar cell will allow it to finally exceed the Shockley-Queisser limit. INZ layers – and their influence on solar cell current density, open circuit voltage, and power conversion efficiency – are analyzed. By considering the principle of detailed balance, Snell's law, and the role that entropy plays, it is shown that INZ layers do not allow a solar cell to exceed the Shockley-Queisser efficiency limit. At best, a solar cell with an INZ layer would have the same Shockley-Queisser limiting efficiency as a conventional solar cell tracked under a direct solar spectrum (direct beam radiation only), yet would suffer diminished efficiency under a global solar spectrum (direct beam plus diffuse light) due to the presence of an external critical acceptance angle.

Efficiency limit of solar cells with index-near-zero photon management layers

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kirk, A.P.

2017-01-01

As single-junction solar cells saturate in efficiency, the topic of photon management has generated interest in the long running quest to exceed the Shockley-Queisser efficiency limit. While a mirror applied to the backside of a solar cell has proven its benefit as a photon management layer in record setting devices that fall within the Shockley-Queisser limit, it has been proposed that a new type of photon management layer – a transparent index-near-zero (INZ) material – applied to the top surface of a solar cell will allow it to finally exceed the Shockley-Queisser limit. INZ layers – and their influence on solar cell current density, open circuit voltage, and power conversion efficiency – are analyzed. By considering the principle of detailed balance, Snell's law, and the role that entropy plays, it is shown that INZ layers do not allow a solar cell to exceed the Shockley-Queisser efficiency limit. At best, a solar cell with an INZ layer would have the same Shockley-Queisser limiting efficiency as a conventional solar cell tracked under a direct solar spectrum (direct beam radiation only), yet would suffer diminished efficiency under a global solar spectrum (direct beam plus diffuse light) due to the presence of an external critical acceptance angle.

Efficiency limit of solar cells with index-near-zero photon management layers

Science.gov (United States)

Kirk, A. P.

2017-05-01

As single-junction solar cells saturate in efficiency, the topic of photon management has generated interest in the long running quest to exceed the Shockley-Queisser efficiency limit. While a mirror applied to the backside of a solar cell has proven its benefit as a photon management layer in record setting devices that fall within the Shockley-Queisser limit, it has been proposed that a new type of photon management layer - a transparent index-near-zero (INZ) material - applied to the top surface of a solar cell will allow it to finally exceed the Shockley-Queisser limit. INZ layers - and their influence on solar cell current density, open circuit voltage, and power conversion efficiency - are analyzed. By considering the principle of detailed balance, Snell's law, and the role that entropy plays, it is shown that INZ layers do not allow a solar cell to exceed the Shockley-Queisser efficiency limit. At best, a solar cell with an INZ layer would have the same Shockley-Queisser limiting efficiency as a conventional solar cell tracked under a direct solar spectrum (direct beam radiation only), yet would suffer diminished efficiency under a global solar spectrum (direct beam plus diffuse light) due to the presence of an external critical acceptance angle.

Transparent solar cell window module

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Chau, Joseph Lik Hang; Chen, Ruei-Tang; Hwang, Gan-Lin; Tsai, Ping-Yuan [Nanopowder and Thin Film Technology Center, ITRI South, Industrial Technology Research Institute, Tainan County 709 (China); Lin, Chien-Chu [I-Lai Acrylic Corporation, Tainan City (China)

2010-03-15

A transparent solar cell window module based on the integration of traditional silicon solar cells and organic-inorganic nanocomposite material was designed and fabricated. The transparent solar cell window module was composed of a nanocomposite light-guide plate and traditional silicon solar cells. The preparation of the nanocomposite light-guide plate is easy without modification of the traditional casting process, the nanoparticles sol can be added directly to the polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) monomer syrup during the process. The solar energy collected by this window can be used to power up small household electrical appliances. (author)

Modeling photovoltaic performance in periodic patterned colloidal quantum dot solar cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Fu, Yulan; Dinku, Abay G; Hara, Yukihiro; Miller, Christopher W; Vrouwenvelder, Kristina T; Lopez, Rene

2015-07-27

Colloidal quantum dot (CQD) solar cells have attracted tremendous attention mostly due to their wide absorption spectrum window and potentially low processability cost. The ultimate efficiency of CQD solar cells is highly limited by their high trap state density. Here we show that the overall device power conversion efficiency could be improved by employing photonic structures that enhance both charge generation and collection efficiencies. By employing a two-dimensional numerical model, we have calculated the characteristics of patterned CQD solar cells based of a simple grating structure. Our calculation predicts a power conversion efficiency as high as 11.2%, with a short circuit current density of 35.2 mA/cm2, a value nearly 1.5 times larger than the conventional flat design, showing the great potential value of patterned quantum dot solar cells.

Highly Flexible and Efficient Solar Steam Generation Device.

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, Chaoji; Li, Yiju; Song, Jianwei; Yang, Zhi; Kuang, Yudi; Hitz, Emily; Jia, Chao; Gong, Amy; Jiang, Feng; Zhu, J Y; Yang, Bao; Xie, Jia; Hu, Liangbing

2017-08-01

Solar steam generation with subsequent steam recondensation has been regarded as one of the most promising techniques to utilize the abundant solar energy and sea water or other unpurified water through water purification, desalination, and distillation. Although tremendous efforts have been dedicated to developing high-efficiency solar steam generation devices, challenges remain in terms of the relatively low efficiency, complicated fabrications, high cost, and inability to scale up. Here, inspired by the water transpiration behavior of trees, the use of carbon nanotube (CNT)-modified flexible wood membrane (F-Wood/CNTs) is demonstrated as a flexible, portable, recyclable, and efficient solar steam generation device for low-cost and scalable solar steam generation applications. Benefitting from the unique structural merits of the F-Wood/CNTs membrane-a black CNT-coated hair-like surface with excellent light absorbability, wood matrix with low thermal conductivity, hierarchical micro- and nanochannels for water pumping and escaping, solar steam generation device based on the F-Wood/CNTs membrane demonstrates a high efficiency of 81% at 10 kW cm -2 , representing one of the highest values ever-reported. The nature-inspired design concept in this study is straightforward and easily scalable, representing one of the most promising solutions for renewable and portable solar energy generation and other related phase-change applications. © 2017 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Effects of anodic aluminum oxide membrane on performance of nanostructured solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Dang, Hongmei; Singh, Vijay

2015-05-01

Three nanowire solar cell device configurations have been fabricated to demonstrate the effects of the host anodized aluminum oxide (AAO) membrane on device performance. The three configurations show similar transmittance spectra, indicating that AAO membrane has negligible optical absorption. Power conversion efficiency (PCE) of the device is studied as a function of the carrier transport and collection in cell structures with and without AAO membrane. Free standing nanowire solar cells exhibit PCE of 9.9%. Through inclusion of AAO in solar cell structure, interface defects and traps caused by humidity and oxygen are reduced, and direct contact of CdTe tentacles with SnO2 and formation of micro shunt shorts are prevented; hence PCE is improved to 11.1%-11.3%. Partially embedded nanowire solar cells further reduce influence of non-ideal and non-uniform nanowire growth and generate a large amount of carriers in axial direction and also a small quantity of carriers in lateral direction, thus becoming a promising solar cell structure. Thus, including AAO membrane in solar cell structure provides favorable electro-optical properties as well as mechanical advantages.

Radiation resistant low bandgap InGaAsP solar cell for multi-junction solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Khan, Aurangzeb; Yamaguchi, Masafumi; Dharmaras, Nathaji; Yamada, Takashi; Tanabe, Tatsuya; Takagishi, Shigenori; Itoh, Hisayoshi; Ohshima, Takeshi

2001-01-01

We have explored the superior radiation tolerance of metal organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) grown, low bandgap, (0.95eV) InGaAsP solar cells as compared to GaAs-on-Ge cells, after 1 MeV electron irradiation. The minority carrier injection due to forward bias and light illumination under low concentration ratio, can lead to enhanced recovery of radiation damage in InGaAsP n + -p junction solar cells. An injection anneal activation energy (0.58eV) of the defects involved in damage/recovery of the InGaAsP solar cells has been estimated from the resultant recovery of the solar cell properties following minority carrier injection. The results suggest that low bandgap radiation resistant InGaAsP (0.95eV) lattice matched to InP substrates provide an alternative to use as bottom cells in multi-junction solar cells instead of less radiation ressitant conventional GaAs based solar cells for space applications. (author)

Electroluminescence from charge transfer states in Donor/Acceptor solar cells

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sherafatipour, Golenaz; Madsen, Morten

Charge photocurrent generation is a key process in solar energy conversion systems. Effective dissociation of the photo-generated electron-hole pairs (excitons) has a strong influence on the efficiency of the organic solar cells. Charge dissociation takes place at the donor/acceptor interface via...... which the maximum open-circuit voltage can be estimated, and further can be used in the modeling and optimization of the OPV devices. [1] C. Deibe, T. Strobe, and V. Dyakonov, “Role of the charge transfer state in organic donor-acceptor solar cells,” Adv. Mater., vol. 22, pp. 4097–4111, 2010. [2] K...... charge transfer (CT) excitons, which is Coulombically bound interfacial electron- hole pairs residing at the donor/acceptor heterojunctions. The CT state represents an intermediate state between the exciton dissociation and recombination back to the ground state. Since the recombination of photo...

BODIPYs for Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Klfout, Hafsah; Stewart, Adam; Elkhalifa, Mahmoud; He, Hongshan

2017-11-22

BODIPY, abbreviation of boron-dipyrromethene, is one class of robust organic molecules that has been used widely in bioimaging, sensing, and logic gate design. Recently, BODIPY dyes have been explored for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs). Studies demonstrate their potential as light absorbers for the conversion of solar energy to electricity. However, their photovoltaic performance is inferior to many other dyes, including porphyrin dyes. In this review, several synthetic strategies of BODIPY dyes for DSCs and their further functionalization are described. The photophysical properties of dye molecules and their photovoltaic performances in DSCs are summarized. We aim to provide readers a clear picture of the field and expect to shed light on the next generation of BODIPY dyes for their applications in solar energy conversion.

Solar Cell Polymer Based Active Ingredients PPV and PCBM

Science.gov (United States)

Hardeli, H.; Sanjaya, H.; Resikarnila, R.; Nitami H, R.

2018-04-01

A polymer solar cell is a solar cell based on a polymer bulk heterojunction structure using the method of thin film, which can convert solar energy into electrical energy. Absorption of light is carried by active material layer PPV: PCBM. This study aims to make solar cells tandem and know the value of converting solar energy into electrical energy and increase the value of efficiency generated through morphological control, ie annealing temperature and the ratio of active layer mixture. The active layer is positioned above the PEDOT:PSS layer on ITO glass substrate. The characterization results show the surface morphology of the PPV:PCBM active layer is quite evenly at annealing temperature of 165 ° C. The result of conversion of electrical energy with a UV light source in annealing samples with temperature 165 ° C is 0.03 mA and voltage of 4.085 V with an efficiency of 2.61% and mixed ratio variation was obtained in comparison of P3HT: PCBM is 1: 3

Corrugation Architecture Enabled Ultraflexible Wafer-Scale High-Efficiency Monocrystalline Silicon Solar Cell

KAUST Repository

Bahabry, Rabab R.

2018-01-02

Advanced classes of modern application require new generation of versatile solar cells showcasing extreme mechanical resilience, large-scale, low cost, and excellent power conversion efficiency. Conventional crystalline silicon-based solar cells offer one of the most highly efficient power sources, but a key challenge remains to attain mechanical resilience while preserving electrical performance. A complementary metal oxide semiconductor-based integration strategy where corrugation architecture enables ultraflexible and low-cost solar cell modules from bulk monocrystalline large-scale (127 × 127 cm) silicon solar wafers with a 17% power conversion efficiency. This periodic corrugated array benefits from an interchangeable solar cell segmentation scheme which preserves the active silicon thickness of 240 μm and achieves flexibility via interdigitated back contacts. These cells can reversibly withstand high mechanical stress and can be deformed to zigzag and bifacial modules. These corrugation silicon-based solar cells offer ultraflexibility with high stability over 1000 bending cycles including convex and concave bending to broaden the application spectrum. Finally, the smallest bending radius of curvature lower than 140 μm of the back contacts is shown that carries the solar cells segments.

Corrugation Architecture Enabled Ultraflexible Wafer-Scale High-Efficiency Monocrystalline Silicon Solar Cell

KAUST Repository

Bahabry, Rabab R.; Kutbee, Arwa T.; Khan, Sherjeel M.; Sepulveda, Adrian C.; Wicaksono, Irmandy; Nour, Maha A.; Wehbe, Nimer; Almislem, Amani Saleh Saad; Ghoneim, Mohamed T.; Sevilla, Galo T.; Syed, Ahad; Shaikh, Sohail F.; Hussain, Muhammad Mustafa

2018-01-01

Advanced classes of modern application require new generation of versatile solar cells showcasing extreme mechanical resilience, large-scale, low cost, and excellent power conversion efficiency. Conventional crystalline silicon-based solar cells offer one of the most highly efficient power sources, but a key challenge remains to attain mechanical resilience while preserving electrical performance. A complementary metal oxide semiconductor-based integration strategy where corrugation architecture enables ultraflexible and low-cost solar cell modules from bulk monocrystalline large-scale (127 × 127 cm) silicon solar wafers with a 17% power conversion efficiency. This periodic corrugated array benefits from an interchangeable solar cell segmentation scheme which preserves the active silicon thickness of 240 μm and achieves flexibility via interdigitated back contacts. These cells can reversibly withstand high mechanical stress and can be deformed to zigzag and bifacial modules. These corrugation silicon-based solar cells offer ultraflexibility with high stability over 1000 bending cycles including convex and concave bending to broaden the application spectrum. Finally, the smallest bending radius of curvature lower than 140 μm of the back contacts is shown that carries the solar cells segments.

Development of solar power generator system; Taiyoko netsufukugo hatsuden system no kaihatsu

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kisara, K; Kumagai, T; Niino, M; Chen, L; Eguchi, K [National Aerospace Laboratory, Tokyo (Japan)

1997-11-25

Described herein is a new hybrid solar power generator system, in which solar energy is separated into the light and heat components by a wavelength-selective filter before being directly converted into electric power, the former for the amorphous solar cell (ASC) unit and the latter for the thermoelectric unit. These units complement with each other to enhance overall efficiency. The ASC unit should have a higher efficiency when it works on the light component, because the heat (infrared) component increases cell temperature and decreases its output. For the ASC unit, the effects of the filter have been tested. The thermoelectric unit, generating power by the Seebeck effect, should have a higher efficiency, if heat flux passing through the unit can be increased, because of increased temperature differential, to which voltage produced increases proportionally. For the thermoelectric unit, heat is collected by a parabolic mirror unit from sunbeams received by a heliostat. Characteristics of these units are grasped almost as expected by the tests. 4 refs., 11 figs., 1 tab.

World's Most Efficient Solar Cell

Science.gov (United States)

World's Most Efficient Solar Cell National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Spectrolab Set Record For , 1999 - A solar cell that can convert sunlight to electricity at a record-setting 32 percent efficiency on Earth. Spectrolab of Sylmar, Calif., "grew" the record-setting solar cell. After

A Bicontinuous Double Gyroid Hybrid Solar Cell

KAUST Repository

Crossland, Edward J. W.

2009-08-12

We report the first successful application of an ordered bicontinuous gyroid semiconducting network in a hybrid bulk heterojunction solar cell. The freestanding gyroid network is fabricated by electrochemical deposition into the 10 nm wide voided channels of a self-assembled, selectively degradable block copolymer film. The highly ordered pore structure is ideal for uniform infiltration of an organic hole transporting material, and solid-state dye-sensitized solar cells only 400 nm thick exhibit up to 1.7% power conversion efficiency. This patterning technique can be readily extended to other promising heterojunction systems and is a major step toward realizing the full potential of self-assembly in the next generation of device technologies. © 2009 American Chemical Society.

Hollow optical fiber induced solar cells with optical energy storage and conversion.

Science.gov (United States)

Ding, Jie; Zhao, Yuanyuan; Duan, Jialong; Duan, Yanyan; Tang, Qunwei

2017-11-09

Hollow optical fiber induced dye-sensitized solar cells are made by twisting Ti wire/N719-TiO 2 nanotube photoanodes and Ti wire/Pt (CoSe, Pt 3 Ni) counter electrodes, yielding a maximized efficiency of 0.7% and good stability. Arising from optical energy storage ability, the solar cells can generate electricity without laser illumination.

Development of a thin film solar cell interconnect for the PowerSphere concept

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Simburger, Edward J.; Matsumoto, James H.; Giants, Thomas W.; Garcia, Alexander; Liu, Simon; Rawal, Suraj P.; Perry, Alan R.; Marshall, Craig H.; Lin, John K.; Scarborough, Stephen E.; Curtis, Henry B.; Kerslake, Thomas W.; Peterson, Todd T.

2005-01-01

Progressive development of microsatellite technologies has resulted in increased demand for lightweight electrical power subsystems including solar arrays. The use of thin film photovoltaics has been recognized as a key solution to meet the power needs. The lightweight cells can generate sufficient power and still meet critical mass requirements. Commercially available solar cells produced on lightweight substrates are being studied as an option to fulfill the power needs. The commercially available solar cells are relatively inexpensive and have a high payoff potential. Commercially available thin film solar cells are primarily being produced for terrestrial applications. The need to convert the solar cell from a terrestrial to a space compatible application is the primary challenge. Solar cell contacts, grids and interconnects need to be designed to be atomic oxygen resistant and withstand rapid thermal cycling environments. A mechanically robust solar cell interconnect is also required in order to withstand handling during fabrication and survive during launch. The need to produce the solar cell interconnects has been identified as a primary goal of the PowerSphere program and is the topic of this paper. Details of the trade study leading to the final design involving the solar cell wrap around contact, flex blanket, welding process, and frame will be presented at the conference

Integration of Solar Cells on Top of CMOS Chips Part I: a-Si Solar Cells

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Lu, J.; Kovalgin, Alexeij Y.; van der Werf, Karine H.M.; Schropp, Ruud E.I.; Schmitz, Jurriaan

2011-01-01

We present the monolithic integration of deepsubmicrometer complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) microchips with a-Si:H solar cells. Solar cells are manufactured directly on the CMOS chips. The microchips maintain comparable electronic performance, and the solar cells show efficiency values

Solar cell concentrating system

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Garg, H.P.; Sharma, V.K.; Agarwal, R.K.

1986-11-01

This study reviews fabrication techniques and testing facilities for different solar cells under concentration which have been developed and tested. It is also aimed to examine solar energy concentrators which are prospective candidates for photovoltaic concentrator systems. This may provide an impetus to the scientists working in the area of solar cell technology

Photovoltaic solar concentrator

Science.gov (United States)

Nielson, Gregory N.; Gupta, Vipin P.; Okandan, Murat; Watts, Michael R.

2016-03-15

A photovoltaic solar concentrator is disclosed with one or more transverse-junction solar cells (also termed point contact solar cells) and a lens located above each solar cell to concentrate sunlight onto the solar cell to generate electricity. Piezoelectric actuators tilt or translate each lens to track the sun using a feedback-control circuit which senses the electricity generated by one or more of the solar cells. The piezoelectric actuators can be coupled through a displacement-multiplier linkage to provide an increased range of movement of each lens. Each lens in the solar concentrator can be supported on a frame (also termed a tilt plate) having three legs, with the movement of the legs being controlled by the piezoelectric actuators.

Study on the best utilization of solar energy. Experimental study of hydrogen generation by water electrolysis using solar battery; Taiyo energy no yuko riyo ni kansuru kenkyu. Taiyo denchi riyosui denki bunkai suiso hassei field test

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kawashima, Y; Murai, K; Nakai, T [Himeji Institute of Technology, Hyogo (Japan)

1997-11-25

Shortcomings of solar energy are that it is subject to weather and is not available in the nighttime. The weak points may be effectively made up for when solar energy collected on a fine day is stored in the form of hydrogen energy for recovery as required. In this report, power generated by solar cells is used for the electrolysis of water for the generation of hydrogen. The amounts of the thus-generated hydrogen and hydrogen energy are determined and, on the basis of the measured amount of insolation, the solar energy availability rate (hydrogen conversion performance) is calculated. The amount of hydrogen generated in fiscal 1996 is also calculated for every month. The hydrogen generation level is quite low in the TiO2 wet type solar cell, approximately 0.2% at most. The current efficiency is fairly high in hydrogen generation using electrolysis, which is approximately 96-97%. The efficiency is higher when several units of electrolyte are connected in series until the solar cell optimum voltage is attained. A linear relationship is found between the daily summation of insolation and the amount of hydrogen generated. 1 ref., 7 figs., 2 tabs.

The interplay of nanostructure and efficiency of polymer solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Chunhong, Yin

2008-12-04

The aim of this thesis is to achieve a deep understanding of the working mechanism of polymer based solar cells and to improve the device performance. Two types of the polymer based solar cells are studied here: the polymer-polymer solar cells, and the polymer-small molecule solar cell which has polymer as electron donor incorporating with organic small molecule as electron acceptor. For the polymer-polymer devices, I compared the photocurrent characteristics of bilayer and blend devices as well as the blend devices with different nano-morphology, which is fine tuned by applying solvents with different boiling points. The main conclusion based on the complementary measurements is that the performance-limiting step is the field-dependent generation of free charge carriers, while bimolecular recombination and charge extraction do not compromise device performance. Regarding polymer-small molecular hybrid solar cells I combined the hole-transporting polymer M3EH-PPV with a novel small molecule electron acceptor vinazene. This molecule can be either deposited from solution or by thermal evaporation, allowing for a large variety of layer architectures to be realized. I then demonstrated that the layer architecture has a large influence on the photovoltaic properties. Solar cells with very high fill factors of up to 57 % and an open circuit voltage of 1V without thermal treatment of the devices were achieved. In the past, fill factors of solar cells exceeding 50 % have only been observed when using fullerene-derivatives as the electron-acceptor. The finding that proper processing of polymer-vinazene devices leads to similar high values is a major step towards the design of efficient polymer-based solar cells. (orig.)

Elaboration of fabrication technology of ITO/CdS/CdTe solar cells on flexible polymer substrates

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Potlog, T.; Spalatu, N.; Capros, N.

2007-01-01

The development of high efficiency, stable, lightweight and flexible solar cell is important for terrestrial and space applications. We have developed a novel process to make solar cells on flexible polymer sheets. A thin layer of CdTe compound semiconductor is used for the absorption of solar light and generation of electrical current. In this work the solar electricity conversion efficiency of 4,66% is the highest efficiency reported for a solar cell grown on a polymer sheet. (authors)

Industrial Silicon Wafer Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Dirk-Holger Neuhaus

2007-01-01

Full Text Available In 2006, around 86% of all wafer-based silicon solar cells were produced using screen printing to form the silver front and aluminium rear contacts and chemical vapour deposition to grow silicon nitride as the antireflection coating onto the front surface. This paper reviews this dominant solar cell technology looking into state-of-the-art equipment and corresponding processes for each process step. The main efficiency losses of this type of solar cell are analyzed to demonstrate the future efficiency potential of this technology. In research and development, more various advanced solar cell concepts have demonstrated higher efficiencies. The question which arises is “why are new solar cell concepts not transferred into industrial production more frequently?”. We look into the requirements a new solar cell technology has to fulfill to have an advantage over the current approach. Finally, we give an overview of high-efficiency concepts which have already been transferred into industrial production.

Bifacial aspects of industrial n-Pasha solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Van Aken, Bas B.; Tool, Kees; Kossen, Eric J.; Carr, Anna J.; Janssen, Gaby J. M.; Newman, Bonna K.; Romijn, Ingrid G.

2017-08-01

Bifacial photovoltaic (PV) modules make optimal use of diffuse and ground-reflected light. The gain in energy yield depends on both the local climatic conditions and the PV system layout. These determine the additional irradiance on the rear of the PV panels. The rear response of the (laminated) solar cell(s) determines how much additional energy this rear irradiance generates. Based on our experiments and simulations, the main parameters that determine the bifaciality factor of solar cells with a front side junction are the rear metal coverage, the base resistivity and the diffusion profile on the rear. These will be evaluated and discussed in this paper. Front-junction solar cells with low base resistivity have a lower short circuit current when illuminated from the rear due to enhanced recombination in the BSF. Stencil printed rear metallization yields a higher bifaciality factor compared to screen printed by reducing the metal coverage and consumption and maintaining the front side efficiency. For our optimized 239 cm2 bifacial cell we estimate that the output with 20% contributed by the rear side is equivalent to that of a 24.4% efficient monofacial cell.

Graphene-enhanced thermal interface materials for heat removal from photovoltaic solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Saadah, M.; Gamalath, D.; Hernandez, E.; Balandin, A. A.

2016-09-01

The increase in the temperature of photovoltaic (PV) solar cells affects negatively their power conversion efficiency and decreases their lifetime. The negative effects are particularly pronounced in concentrator solar cells. Therefore, it is crucial to limit the PV cell temperature by effectively removing the excess heat. Conventional thermal phase change materials (PCMs) and thermal interface materials (TIMs) do not possess the thermal conductivity values sufficient for thermal management of the next generation of PV cells. In this paper, we report the results of investigation of the increased efficiency of PV cells with the use of graphene-enhanced TIMs. Graphene reveals the highest values of the intrinsic thermal conductivity. It was also shown that the thermal conductivity of composites can be increased via utilization of graphene fillers. We prepared TIMs with up to 6% of graphene designed specifically for PV cell application. The solar cells were tested using the solar simulation module. It was found that the drop in the output voltage of the solar panel under two-sun concentrated illumination can be reduced from 19% to 6% when grapheneenhanced TIMs are used. The proposed method can recover up to 75% of the power loss in solar cells.

Mechanism on radiation degradation of Si space solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yamaguchi, Masafumi; Taylor, S.J.; Hisamatsu, Tadashi; Matsuda, Sumio

1998-01-01

Radiation testing of Si n + -p-p + structure space solar cells has revealed an anomalous increase in short-circuit current Isc, followed by an abrupt decrease and cell failure, induced by high fluence electron and proton irradiations. A model to explain these phenomena by expressing the change in carrier concentration p of the base region is proposed in addition to the well-known model where Isc is decreased by minority-carrier lifetime reduction with irradiation. Change in carrier concentration causes broadening the depletion layer to contribute increase in the generated photocurrent and increase in recombination-generation current in the depletion layer, and increase in the resistivity of the base layer to result in the abrupt decrease of Isc and failure of the solar cell. Type conversion from p-type to n-type in base layer has been confirmed by EBIC (electron-beam induced current) and spectral response measurements. Moreover, origins of radiation-induced defects in heavily irradiated Si and generation of deep donor defects have also been examined by using DLTS (deep level transient spectroscopy) analysis. (author)

Data monitoring system for PV solar generators

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Stoev, M.; Katerski, A.; Williams, A.

2000-01-01

The two 1.5 kWp photovoltaic (PV) solar generators are installed and the new PC data monitoring system is developed by applying EC standards for European Solar Test Installation (ESTI). The schematic system diagram of PV generator is presented. The recording parameters for analytical and global monitoring are discussed. The meteorological data from ESTI sensors, temperature sensor and electrical data from inverter and calibrated shunt are stored via analog digital converters (ADC) on a hard disk of data storage PC. Data Logger and Monitor software for automatic data acquisition, treatment and visual distance control of all output PV data from PV solar generator has been created

Laser scanning of experimental solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Plunkett, B. C.; Lasswell, P. G.

1980-01-01

A description is presented of a laser scanning instrument which makes it possible to display and measure the spatial response of a solar cell. Examples are presented to illustrate the use of generated micrographs in the isolation of flaws and features of the cell. The laser scanner system uses a 4 mW, CW helium-neon laser, operating a wavelength of 0.633 micrometers. The beam is deflected by two mirror galvanometers arranged to scan in orthogonal directions. After being focused on the solar cell by the beam focusing lens, the moving light spot raster scans the specimen. The current output of the photovoltaic device under test, as a function of the scan dot position, can be displayed in several modes. The laser scanner has proved to be a very useful diagnostic tool in optimizing the process design of transparent metal film photovoltaic devices on Zn3P2, a relatively new photovoltaic material.

Degradation of CIGS solar cells

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Theelen, M.J.

2015-01-01

Thin film CIGS solar cells and individual layers within these solar cells have been tested in order to assess their long term stability. Alongside with the execution of standard tests, in which elevated temperatures and humidity levels are used, the solar cells have also been exposed to a

Solar cell with back side contacts

Science.gov (United States)

Nielson, Gregory N; Okandan, Murat; Cruz-Campa, Jose Luis; Resnick, Paul J; Wanlass, Mark Woodbury; Clews, Peggy J

2013-12-24

A III-V solar cell is described herein that includes all back side contacts. Additionally, the positive and negative electrical contacts contact compoud semiconductor layers of the solar cell other than the absorbing layer of the solar cell. That is, the positive and negative electrical contacts contact passivating layers of the solar cell.

Three-Terminal Amorphous Silicon Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Cheng-Hung Tai

2011-01-01

Full Text Available Many defects exist within amorphous silicon since it is not crystalline. This provides recombination centers, thus reducing the efficiency of a typical a-Si solar cell. A new structure is presented in this paper: a three-terminal a-Si solar cell. The new back-to-back p-i-n/n-i-p structure increased the average electric field in a solar cell. A typical a-Si p-i-n solar cell was also simulated for comparison using the same thickness and material parameters. The 0.28 μm-thick three-terminal a-Si solar cell achieved an efficiency of 11.4%, while the efficiency of a typical a-Si p-i-n solar cell was 9.0%. Furthermore, an efficiency of 11.7% was achieved by thickness optimization of the three-terminal solar cell.

Recent advances in sensitized mesoscopic solar cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Grätzel, Michael

2009-11-17

Perhaps the largest challenge for our global society is to find ways to replace the slowly but inevitably vanishing fossil fuel supplies by renewable resources and, at the same time, avoid negative effects from the current energy system on climate, environment, and health. The quality of human life to a large degree depends upon the availability of clean energy sources. The worldwide power consumption is expected to double in the next 3 decades because of the increase in world population and the rising demand of energy in the developing countries. This implies enhanced depletion of fossil fuel reserves, leading to further aggravation of the environmental pollution. As a consequence of dwindling resources, a huge power supply gap of 14 terawatts is expected to open up by year 2050 equaling today's entire consumption, thus threatening to create a planetary emergency of gigantic dimensions. Solar energy is expected to play a crucial role as a future energy source. The sun provides about 120,000 terawatts to the earth's surface, which amounts to 6000 times the present rate of the world's energy consumption. However, capturing solar energy and converting it to electricity or chemical fuels, such as hydrogen, at low cost and using abundantly available raw materials remains a huge challenge. Chemistry is expected to make pivotal contributions to identify environmentally friendly solutions to this energy problem. One area of great promise is that of solar converters generally referred to as "organic photovoltaic cells" (OPV) that employ organic constituents for light harvesting or charge carrier transport. While this field is still in its infancy, it is receiving enormous research attention, with the number of publications growing exponentially over the past decade. The advantage of this new generation of solar cells is that they can be produced at low cost, i.e., potentially less than 1 U.S. $/peak watt. Some but not all OPV embodiments can avoid the expensive and energy

Cost Effective Polymer Solar Cells Research and Education

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Sun, Sam-Shajing [Norfolk State Univ, Norfolk, VA (United States)

2015-10-13

The technical or research objective of this project is to investigate and develop new polymers and polymer based optoelectronic devices for potentially cost effective (or cost competitive), durable, lightweight, flexible, and high efficiency solar energy conversion applications. The educational objective of this project includes training of future generation scientists, particularly young, under-represented minority scientists, working in the areas related to the emerging organic/polymer based solar energy technologies and related optoelectronic devices. Graduate and undergraduate students will be directly involved in scientific research addressing issues related to the development of polymer based solar cell technology.

Hybrid solar cells composed of perovskite and polymer photovoltaic structures

Science.gov (United States)

Phaometvarithorn, Apatsanan; Chuangchote, Surawut; Kumnorkaew, Pisist; Wootthikanokkhan, Jatuphorn

2018-06-01

Organic/inorganic lead halide perovskite solar cells have recently attracted much attention in photovoltaic research, due to the devices show promising ways to achieve high efficiencies. The perovskite devices with high efficiencies, however, are typically fabricated in tandem solar cell which is complicated. In this research work, we introduce a solar cell device with the combination of CH3NH3PbI3-xClx perovskite and bulk heterojunction PCDTBT:PC70BM polymer without any tandem structure. The new integrated perovskite/polymer hybrid structure of ITO/PEDOT:PSS/perovskite/PCDTBT:PC70BM/PC70BM/TiOx/Al provides higher power conversion efficiency (PCE) of devices compared with conventional perovskite cell structure. With the optimized PCDTBT:PC70BM thickness of ∼70 nm, the highest PCE of 11.67% is achieved. Variation of conducting donor polymers in this new structure is also preliminary demonstrated. This study provides an attractively innovative structure and a promising design for further development of the new-generation solar cells.

Radiation resistance of thin-film solar cells for space photovoltaic power

Science.gov (United States)

Woodyard, James R.; Landis, Geoffrey A.

1991-01-01

Copper indium diselenide, cadmium telluride, and amorphous silicon alloy solar cells have achieved noteworthy performance and are currently being studied for space power applications. Cadmium sulfide cells had been the subject of much effort but are no longer considered for space applications. A review is presented of what is known about the radiation degradation of thin film solar cells in space. Experimental cadmium telluride and amorphous silicon alloy cells are reviewed. Damage mechanisms and radiation induced defect generation and passivation in the amorphous silicon alloy cell are discussed in detail due to the greater amount of experimental data available.

Effects of anodic aluminum oxide membrane on performance of nanostructured solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dang, Hongmei; Singh, Vijay

2015-01-01

Three nanowire solar cell device configurations have been fabricated to demonstrate the effects of the host anodized aluminum oxide (AAO) membrane on device performance. The three configurations show similar transmittance spectra, indicating that AAO membrane has negligible optical absorption. Power conversion efficiency (PCE) of the device is studied as a function of the carrier transport and collection in cell structures with and without AAO membrane. Free standing nanowire solar cells exhibit PCE of 9.9%. Through inclusion of AAO in solar cell structure, interface defects and traps caused by humidity and oxygen are reduced, and direct contact of CdTe tentacles with SnO 2 and formation of micro shunt shorts are prevented; hence PCE is improved to 11.1%–11.3%. Partially embedded nanowire solar cells further reduce influence of non-ideal and non-uniform nanowire growth and generate a large amount of carriers in axial direction and also a small quantity of carriers in lateral direction, thus becoming a promising solar cell structure. Thus, including AAO membrane in solar cell structure provides favorable electro-optical properties as well as mechanical advantages. (paper)

Bias-dependent high saturation solar LBIC scanning of solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Vorster, F.J.; van Dyk, E.E. [Department of Physics, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, P.O. Box 77000, Port Elizabeth 6031 (South Africa)

2007-06-15

A light beam-induced current measurement system that uses concentrated solar radiation as a beam probe to map spatially distributed defects on a solar cell has been developed and tested [F.J. Vorster, E.E. van Dyk, Rev. Sci. Instrum., submitted for review]. The induced current response from a flat plate EFG Si solar cell was mapped as a function of surface position and cell bias by using a solar light beam induced current (S-LBIC) mapping system while at the same time dynamically biasing the whole cell with an external voltage. This paper examines the issues relating to transient capacitive effects as well as the electrical behaviour of typical solar cell defect mechanisms under spot illumination. By examining the bias dependence of the S-LBIC maps, various defect mechanisms of photovoltaic (PV) cells under concentrated solar irradiance may be identified. The techniques employed to interpret the spatially distributed IV curves as well as initial results are discussed. (author)

Study of interface layer effect in organic solar cells by electric-field-induced optical second-harmonic generation measurement

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Taguchi, Dai; Sumiyoshi, Ryota; Chen, Xiangyu; Manaka, Takaaki; Iwamoto, Mitsumasa, E-mail: iwamoto@pe.titech.ac.jp

2014-03-03

By using electric-field-induced optical second-harmonic generation (EFISHG) measurement, we studied the effect of the use of bathocuproine (BCP) interface layer. The EFISHG measurements of indium–zinc–oxide (IZO)/C{sub 60}/Al diodes showed that the BCP layer inserted between C{sub 60} and Al formed an electrostatic field |E{sub i}| = 2.5 × 10{sup 4} V/cm in the C{sub 60} layer, pointing in a direction from the Al to the IZO. Accordingly, in the IZO/pentacene/C{sub 60}/BCP/Al organic solar cells (OSCs), holes (electrons) move to the IZO (Al) electrode, enhancing the short-circuit current. The EFISHG measurement is capable of directly probing internal fields in the layers used for OSCs, and is helpful for studying the contribution of the interface layer in OSCs. - Highlights: • Internal field in organic solar cells (OSCs) were directly probed. • Interface layer formed internal electric field, enhancing the OSC performance. • Maxwell–Wagner effect accounts for the internal electric field formation.

Solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1980-01-01

A method of producing solar cells is described which consists of producing a substantially monocrystalline tubular body of silicon or other suitable semiconductor material, treating this body to form an annular rectifying junction and then cutting it longitudinally to form a number of nearly flat ribbons from which the solar cells are fabricated. The P=N rectifying junction produced by the formation of silicon dioxide on the layers at the inner and outer surfaces of the body can be formed by ion-implantation or diffusion. (U.K.)

Flat plate vs. concentrator solar photovoltaic cells - A manufacturing cost analysis

Science.gov (United States)

Granon, L. A.; Coleman, M. G.

1980-01-01

The choice of which photovoltaic system (flat plate or concentrator) to use for utilizing solar cells to generate electricity depends mainly on the cost. A detailed, comparative manufacturing cost analysis of the two types of systems is presented. Several common assumptions, i.e., cell thickness, interest rate, power rate, factory production life, polysilicon cost, and direct labor rate are utilized in this analysis. Process sequences, cost variables, and sensitivity analyses have been studied, and results of the latter show that the most important parameters which determine manufacturing costs are concentration ratio, manufacturing volume, and cell efficiency. The total cost per watt of the flat plate solar cell is $1.45, and that of the concentrator solar cell is $1.85, the higher cost being due to the increased process complexity and material costs.

Lessons learned: from dye-sensitized solar cells to all-solid-state hybrid devices.

Science.gov (United States)

Docampo, Pablo; Guldin, Stefan; Leijtens, Tomas; Noel, Nakita K; Steiner, Ullrich; Snaith, Henry J

2014-06-25

The field of solution-processed photovoltaic cells is currently in its second spring. The dye-sensitized solar cell is a widely studied and longstanding candidate for future energy generation. Recently, inorganic absorber-based devices have reached new record efficiencies, with the benefits of all-solid-state devices. In this rapidly changing environment, this review sheds light on recent developments in all-solid-state solar cells in terms of electrode architecture, alternative sensitizers, and hole-transporting materials. These concepts are of general applicability to many next-generation device platforms. © 2014 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Reports on 1979 result of Sunshine Project. Investigation and research on solar energy utilization system (solar thermal power generation system); 1979 nendo taiyo energy riyo system chosa kenkyu. Taiyoko hatsuden system

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

1980-03-01

In connection with the practicability of a solar thermal power generation system, examination was made on the technical economic problems and the operation method as well as on the problems of required performance of the constituent equipment, with the measuring method and performance evaluation method examined that are suitable for various devices. The items for the examination are as follows: (1) Silicon as the raw material for solar cells and its R and D, (2) Amorphous silicon solar cells, (3) R and D on low cost solar cells and array, (4) Basic design for photovoltaic generation system, and (5) Problems and technical subjects for solar cell standard measurement. The research themes and items for the above examination are listed as below: (1) Demand trend for raw material silicon, overseas trend, and development plan for polycrystalline silicon; (2) R and D plan for amorphous Si solar cell and its system, their optimum design, and their cost analysis and economic effect; (3) Technological investigation on cells and examination on array; (4) Basic design, peripheral equipment for system, and development schedule; (5) Report on the first actual state investigation concerning instrumentation of solar cells, i.e., on 'instrumentation and deviation in transformation efficiency', calibration system, problems of instrumentation of new device, problems of reliability test method, situation in various countries, and trend in atmospheric turbidimeter. (NEDO)

Reports on 1979 result of Sunshine Project. Investigation and research on solar energy utilization system (solar thermal power generation system); 1979 nendo taiyo energy riyo system chosa kenkyu. Taiyoko hatsuden system

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

1980-03-01

In connection with the practicability of a solar thermal power generation system, examination was made on the technical economic problems and the operation method as well as on the problems of required performance of the constituent equipment, with the measuring method and performance evaluation method examined that are suitable for various devices. The items for the examination are as follows: (1) Silicon as the raw material for solar cells and its R and D, (2) Amorphous silicon solar cells, (3) R and D on low cost solar cells and array, (4) Basic design for photovoltaic generation system, and (5) Problems and technical subjects for solar cell standard measurement. The research themes and items for the above examination are listed as below: (1) Demand trend for raw material silicon, overseas trend, and development plan for polycrystalline silicon; (2) R and D plan for amorphous Si solar cell and its system, their optimum design, and their cost analysis and economic effect; (3) Technological investigation on cells and examination on array; (4) Basic design, peripheral equipment for system, and development schedule; (5) Report on the first actual state investigation concerning instrumentation of solar cells, i.e., on 'instrumentation and deviation in transformation efficiency', calibration system, problems of instrumentation of new device, problems of reliability test method, situation in various countries, and trend in atmospheric turbidimeter. (NEDO)

New mounting improves solar-cell efficiency

Science.gov (United States)

Shepard, N. F., Jr.

1980-01-01

Method boosts output by about 20 percent by trapping and redirecting solar radiation without increasing module depth. Mounted solar-cell array is covered with internally reflecting plate. Plate is attached to each cell by transparent adhesive, and space between cells is covered with layer of diffusely reflecting material. Solar energy falling on space between cells is diffused and reflected internally by plate until it is reflected onto solar cell.

Perovskite Materials: Solar Cell and Optoelectronic Applications

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Yang, Bin [ORNL; Geohegan, David B [ORNL; Xiao, Kai [ORNL

2017-01-01

Hybrid organometallic trihalide perovskites are promising candidates in the applications for next-generation, high-performance, low-cost optoelectronic devices, including photovoltaics, light emitting diodes, and photodetectors. Particularly, the solar cells based on this type of materials have reached 22% lab scale power conversion efficiency in only about seven years, comparable to the other thin film photovoltaic technologies. Hybrid perovskite materials not only exhibit superior optoelectronic properties, but also show many interesting physical properties such as ion migration and defect physics, which may allow the exploration of more device functionalities. In this article, the fundamental understanding of the interrelationships between crystal structure, electronic structure, and material properties is discussed. Various chemical synthesis and processing methods for superior device performance in solar cells and optoelectronic devices are reviewed.

Nanocomposite-Based Bulk Heterojunction Hybrid Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Bich Phuong Nguyen

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Photovoltaic devices based on nanocomposites composed of conjugated polymers and inorganic nanocrystals show promise for the fabrication of low-cost third-generation thin film photovoltaics. In theory, hybrid solar cells can combine the advantages of the two classes of materials to potentially provide high power conversion efficiencies of up to 10%; however, certain limitations on the current within a hybrid solar cell must be overcome. Current limitations arise from incompatibilities among the various intradevice interfaces and the uncontrolled aggregation of nanocrystals during the step in which the nanocrystals are mixed into the polymer matrix. Both effects can lead to charge transfer and transport inefficiencies. This paper highlights potential strategies for resolving these obstacles and presents an outlook on the future directions of this field.

Design and Performance of 20 Watts Portable Solar Generator

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Majid, Z A Abdul; Hazali, N; Hanafiah, M A K M; Abdullah, A A; Ismail, A F; Ruslan, M H; Sopian, K; Azmi, M S Mohd

2012-01-01

A new portable solar generator has been developed to generate electricity. It has the potential to replace petrol generator, widely used by peddlers at night markets (pasar malam). Conventional generators are heavy, oily, have high maintenance and use fossil fuel to generate electricity. The solar generator can generate 20 Watts of electricity. This amount of power can supply up to 96 hours of electricity for the purpose of lighting and running small electrical appliances. The power output is (alternating current) AC current using 150 Watts inverter with 200 Watts surge, suitable for all commercial single phase electric appliances. Solar charge controller is used to maximize the charging rate and to protect the battery. The system has low maintenance whereby the batteries need to be changed every three to four years, depending on the usage. The main concepts of portable solar generator are to reduce installation cost and to introduce a compact design of an optimal energy sizing system. The materials used to develop the solar generator can be easily obtained from local markets, thus reducing the cost of developing the system and making it suitable for commercialization.

ADielectric Multilayer Filter for Combining Photovoltaics with a Stirling Engine for Improvement of the Efficiency of Solar Electricity Generation

Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

寿春晖; 骆仲泱; 王涛; 沈伟东; ROSENGARTEN Gary; 王诚; 倪明江; 岑可法

2011-01-01

In this Letter we outline a dielectric multilayer spectrally selective filter designed for solar energy applications. The optical performance of this 78-layer interference filter constructed by TiOx and SiO2 is presented. A hybrid system combining photovoltaic cells with a solar-powered Stirling engine using the designed filter is analyzed. The calculated results show the advantages of this spectrally selective method for solar power generation.%In this Letter we outline a dielectric multilayer spectrally selective filter designed for solar energy applications.The optical performance of this 78-layer interference filter constructed by TiOx and SiO2 is presented.A hybrid system combining photovoltaic cells with a solar-powered Stirling engine using the designed filter is analyzed.The calculated results show the advantages of this spectrally selective method for solar power generation.

Quantum dot solar cell

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ahamefula, U.C.; Sulaiman, M.Y.; Sopian, K.; Ibarahim, Z.; Ibrahim, N.; Alghoul, M.A.; Haw, L.C.; Yahya, M.; Amin, N.; Mat, S.; Ruslan, M.H.

2009-01-01

Full text: The much awaited desire of replacing fossil fuel with photovoltaic will remain a fairy tale if the myriad of issues facing solar cell development are marginalized. Foremost in the list is the issue of cost. Silicon has reached a stage where its use on large scale can no longer be lavishly depended upon. The demand for high grade silicon from the microelectronics and solar industries has soared leading to scarcity. New approach has to be sought. Notable is the increased attention on thin films such as cadmium telluride, copper indium gallium diselenide, amorphous silicon, and the not so thin non-crystalline family of silicon. While efforts to address the issues of stability, toxicity and efficiency of these systems are ongoing, another novel approach is quietly making its appearance - quantum dots. Quantum dots seem to be promising candidates for solar cells because of the opportunity to manipulate their energy levels allowing absorption of a wider solar spectrum. Utilization of minute quantity of these nano structures is enough to bring the cost of solar cell down and to ascertain sustainable supply of useful material. The paper outlines the progress that has been made on quantum dot solar cells. (author)

New Sunshine Program for fiscal 2000. Development of photovoltaic power system commercialization technology (Development of ultrahigh-efficiency crystalline compound solar cell manufacturing technology - Surveys and studies of peripheral key technologies/Surveys of environmentally-friendliness enhancement for next-generation solar cell development); 2000 nendo New sunshine keikaku seika hokokusho. Taiyoko hatsuden system jitsuyoka gijutsu kaihatsu - Chokokoritsu kessho kagobutsu taiyo denchi no seizo gijutsu kaihatsu (Shuhen yoso gijutsu ni kansuru kenkyu chosa, Jisedai taiyodenchi kaihatsu kankyo tekioka chosa)

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2001-03-01

Though the trends of solar cell development are becoming increasingly diverse across the world, yet none has emerged to promise a stable solar cell supply in the future. Under the circumstances, studies were conducted to clarify strategies for solar cell technology development which would be well adapted to Japan's social environments, with the trends of development in the United States and European countries taken into consideration. The surveys covered the research and development and diffusion of photovoltaic power generation in the United States and European countries, and their solar cell research and development strategies and trends of development were put together. Surveys were also conducted into the research and development of unconventional types of solar cells, such as the dye-sensitized solar cell, organic solar cell, conjugate polymer solar cell, and the polymer/C{sub 60} based solar cell, and into the status of resources of materials for solar cells such as gallium, arsenic, cadmium, tellurium, indium, selenium, and germanium. Regarding the future of photovoltaic power generation research and development, it was concluded that commercialization technology development and basic research and development should continue. Also pointed out was the importance of the enlargement of the market for photovoltaic power generation systems. (NEDO)

New Sunshine Program for fiscal 2000. Development of photovoltaic power system commercialization technology (Development of ultrahigh-efficiency crystalline compound solar cell manufacturing technology - Surveys and studies of peripheral key technologies/Surveys of environmentally-friendliness enhancement for next-generation solar cell development); 2000 nendo New sunshine keikaku seika hokokusho. Taiyoko hatsuden system jitsuyoka gijutsu kaihatsu - Chokokoritsu kessho kagobutsu taiyo denchi no seizo gijutsu kaihatsu (Shuhen yoso gijutsu ni kansuru kenkyu chosa, Jisedai taiyodenchi kaihatsu kankyo tekioka chosa)

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2001-03-01

Though the trends of solar cell development are becoming increasingly diverse across the world, yet none has emerged to promise a stable solar cell supply in the future. Under the circumstances, studies were conducted to clarify strategies for solar cell technology development which would be well adapted to Japan's social environments, with the trends of development in the United States and European countries taken into consideration. The surveys covered the research and development and diffusion of photovoltaic power generation in the United States and European countries, and their solar cell research and development strategies and trends of development were put together. Surveys were also conducted into the research and development of unconventional types of solar cells, such as the dye-sensitized solar cell, organic solar cell, conjugate polymer solar cell, and the polymer/C{sub 60} based solar cell, and into the status of resources of materials for solar cells such as gallium, arsenic, cadmium, tellurium, indium, selenium, and germanium. Regarding the future of photovoltaic power generation research and development, it was concluded that commercialization technology development and basic research and development should continue. Also pointed out was the importance of the enlargement of the market for photovoltaic power generation systems. (NEDO)

Studies of effect of heterocyclic dyes in photogalvanic cells for solar ...

Indian Academy of Sciences (India)

Unknown

Studies of effect of heterocyclic dyes in photogalvanic cells for solar ... observed and current–voltage characteristics of the cell studied, and a mechanism has been proposed for the generation ... dye work effectively in the strong alkaline range.

Advances in High-Efficiency III-V Multijunction Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Richard R. King

2007-01-01

Full Text Available The high efficiency of multijunction concentrator cells has the potential to revolutionize the cost structure of photovoltaic electricity generation. Advances in the design of metamorphic subcells to reduce carrier recombination and increase voltage, wide-band-gap tunnel junctions capable of operating at high concentration, metamorphic buffers to transition from the substrate lattice constant to that of the epitaxial subcells, concentrator cell AR coating and grid design, and integration into 3-junction cells with current-matched subcells under the terrestrial spectrum have resulted in new heights in solar cell performance. A metamorphic Ga0.44In0.56P/Ga0.92In0.08As/ Ge 3-junction solar cell from this research has reached a record 40.7% efficiency at 240 suns, under the standard reporting spectrum for terrestrial concentrator cells (AM1.5 direct, low-AOD, 24.0 W/cm2, 25∘C, and experimental lattice-matched 3-junction cells have now also achieved over 40% efficiency, with 40.1% measured at 135 suns. This metamorphic 3-junction device is the first solar cell to reach over 40% in efficiency, and has the highest solar conversion efficiency for any type of photovoltaic cell developed to date. Solar cells with more junctions offer the potential for still higher efficiencies to be reached. Four-junction cells limited by radiative recombination can reach over 58% in principle, and practical 4-junction cell efficiencies over 46% are possible with the right combination of band gaps, taking into account series resistance and gridline shadowing. Many of the optimum band gaps for maximum energy conversion can be accessed with metamorphic semiconductor materials. The lower current in cells with 4 or more junctions, resulting in lower I2R resistive power loss, is a particularly significant advantage in concentrator PV systems. Prototype 4-junction terrestrial concentrator cells have been grown by metal-organic vapor-phase epitaxy, with preliminary measured

Dye Sensitized Solar Cell, DSSC

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Pongsatorn Amornpitoksuk

2003-07-01

Full Text Available A dye sensitized solar cell is a new type of solar cell. The operating system of this solar cell type is similar to plant’s photosynthesis process. The sensitizer is available for absorption light and transfer electrons to nanocrystalline metal oxide semiconductor. The ruthenium(II complexes with polypyridyl ligands are usually used as the sensitizers in solar cell. At the present time, the complex of [Ru(2,2',2'’-(COOH3- terpy(NCS3] is the most efficient sensitizer. The total photon to current conversion efficiency was approximately 10% at AM = 1.5.

On-Orbit Measurement of Next Generation Space Solar Cell Technology on the International Space Station

Science.gov (United States)

Wolford, David S.; Myers, Matthew G.; Prokop, Norman F.; Krasowski, Michael J.; Parker, David S.; Cassidy, Justin C.; Davies, William E.; Vorreiter, Janelle O.; Piszczor, Michael F.; McNatt, Jeremiah S.

2015-01-01

Measurement is essential for the evaluation of new photovoltaic (PV) technology for space solar cells. NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) is in the process of measuring several solar cells in a supplemental experiment on NASA Goddard Space Flight Center's (GSFC) Robotic Refueling Mission's (RRM) Task Board 4 (TB4). Four industry and government partners have provided advanced PV devices for measurement and orbital environment testing. The experiment will be on-orbit for approximately 18 months. It is completely self-contained and will provide its own power and internal data storage. Several new cell technologies including four- junction (4J) Inverted Metamorphic Multijunction (IMM) cells will be evaluated and the results compared to ground-based measurements.

Influence of electron transport on the efficiency of polymer-based solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kuxhaus, Viktor; Jaiser, Frank; Neher, Dieter [Institute of Physics and Astronomy, University Potsdam (Germany); Voges, Frank [Merck KGaA, Darmstadt (Germany)

2010-07-01

Recently, we showed that the mobility of electrons in polymer-based solar cells has a large influence on the overall performance of such devices. Here, we investigate the correlation between electron mobility and charge generation efficiency in organic bilayer solar cells for a series of electron transporting materials (ETMs) with comparable HOMO and LUMO levels. The electron mobility was measured by transient electroluminescence. Here, a thin M3EH-PPV was used as a sensing layer. The interface between M3EH-PPV and ETM acted as a recombination zone of electrons transported through the ETM layer and holes that are blocked at the interface. Therefore, the electron mobility can easily be determined from the onset of M3EH-PPV emission which is spectrally well separated from the ETM emission. To determine the charge generation efficiency, the different ETMs were combined in bilayer solar cell with PFB as donator.

"Plastic" solar cells: self-assembly of bulk heterojunction nanomaterials by spontaneous phase separation.

Science.gov (United States)

Peet, Jeffrey; Heeger, Alan J; Bazan, Guillermo C

2009-11-17

As the global demand for low-cost renewable energy sources intensifies, interest in new routes for converting solar energy to electricity is rapidly increasing. Although photovoltaic cells have been commercially available for more than 50 years, only 0.1% of the total electricity generated in the United States comes directly from sunlight. The earliest commercial solar technology remains the basis for the most prevalent devices in current use, namely, highly-ordered crystalline, inorganic solar cells, commonly referred to as silicon cells. Another class of solar cells that has recently inspired significant academic and industrial excitement is the bulk heterojunction (BHJ) "plastic" solar cell. Research by a rapidly growing community of scientists across the globe is generating a steady stream of new insights into the fundamental physics, the materials design and synthesis, the film processing and morphology, and the device science and architecture of BHJ technology. Future progress in the fabrication of high-performance BHJ cells will depend on our ability to combine aspects of synthetic and physical chemistry, condensed matter physics, and materials science. In this Account, we use a combination of characterization tools to tie together recent advances in BHJ morphology characterization, device photophysics, and thin-film solution processing, illustrating how to identify the limiting factors in solar cell performance. We also highlight how new processing methods, which control both the BHJ phase separation and the internal order of the components, can be implemented to increase the power conversion efficiency (PCE). The failure of many innovative materials to achieve high performance in BHJ solar cell devices has been blamed on "poor morphology" without significant characterization of either the structure of the phase-separated morphology or the nature of the charge carrier recombination. We demonstrate how properly controlling the "nanomorphology", which is

Solar atmosphere wave dynamics generated by solar global oscillating eigenmodes

Science.gov (United States)

Griffiths, M. K.; Fedun, V.; Erdélyi, R.; Zheng, R.

2018-01-01

The solar atmosphere exhibits a diverse range of wave phenomena, where one of the earliest discovered was the five-minute global acoustic oscillation, also referred to as the p-mode. The analysis of wave propagation in the solar atmosphere may be used as a diagnostic tool to estimate accurately the physical characteristics of the Sun's atmospheric layers. In this paper, we investigate the dynamics and upward propagation of waves which are generated by the solar global eigenmodes. We report on a series of hydrodynamic simulations of a realistically stratified model of the solar atmosphere representing its lower region from the photosphere to low corona. With the objective of modelling atmospheric perturbations, propagating from the photosphere into the chromosphere, transition region and low corona, generated by the photospheric global oscillations the simulations use photospheric drivers mimicking the solar p-modes. The drivers are spatially structured harmonics across the computational box parallel to the solar surface. The drivers perturb the atmosphere at 0.5 Mm above the bottom boundary of the model and are placed coincident with the location of the temperature minimum. A combination of the VALIIIC and McWhirter solar atmospheres are used as the background equilibrium model. We report how synthetic photospheric oscillations may manifest in a magnetic field free model of the quiet Sun. To carry out the simulations, we employed the magnetohydrodynamics code, SMAUG (Sheffield MHD Accelerated Using GPUs). Our results show that the amount of energy propagating into the solar atmosphere is consistent with a model of solar global oscillations described by Taroyan and Erdélyi (2008) using the Klein-Gordon equation. The computed results indicate a power law which is compared to observations reported by Ireland et al. (2015) using data from the Solar Dynamics Observatory/Atmospheric Imaging Assembly.

Dye Sensitized Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Di Wei

2010-03-01

Full Text Available Dye sensitized solar cell (DSSC is the only solar cell that can offer both the flexibility and transparency. Its efficiency is comparable to amorphous silicon solar cells but with a much lower cost. This review not only covers the fundamentals of DSSC but also the related cutting-edge research and its development for industrial applications. Most recent research topics on DSSC, for example, applications of nanostructured TiO2, ZnO electrodes, ionic liquid electrolytes, carbon nanotubes, graphene and solid state DSSC have all been included and discussed.

Charge generation in organic solar cell materials studied by terahertz spectroscopy

KAUST Repository

Scarongella, M.

2015-09-09

We have investigated the photophysics in neat films of conjugated polymer PBDTTPD and its blend with PCBM using terahertz time-domain spectroscopy. This material has very high efficiency when used in organic solar cells. We were able to identify a THz signature for bound excitons in neat PBDTTPD films, pointing to important delocalization in those excitons. Then, we investigated the nature and local mobility (orders of magnitude higher than bulk mobility) of charges in the PBDTTPPD:PCBM blend as a function of excitation wavelength, fluence and pump-probe time delay. At low pump fluence (no bimolecular recombination phenomena), we were able to observe prompt and delayed charge generation components, the latter originating from excitons created in neat polymer domains which, thanks to delocalization, could reach the PCBM interface and dissociate to charges on a time scale of 1 ps. The nature of the photogenerated charges did not change between 0.5 ps and 800 ps after photo-excitation, which indicated that the excitons split directly into relatively free charges on an ultrafast time scale. © (2015) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.

Graphene as transparent and current spreading electrode in silicon solar cell

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Behura, Sanjay K., E-mail: sanjaybehura@gmail.com; Nayak, Sasmita; Jani, Omkar [Solar Energy Research Wing, Gujarat Energy Research and Management Institute - Research, Innovation and Incubation Centre, Gandhinagar 382007, Gujarat (India); Mahala, Pramila [School of Solar Energy, Pandit Deendayal Petroleum University, Gandhinagar 382007, Gujarat (India)

2014-11-15

Fabricated bi-layer graphene (BLG) has been studied as transparent and current spreading electrode (TCSE) for silicon solar cell, using TCAD-Silvaco 2D simulation. We have carried out comparative study using both Ag grids and BLG as current spreading electrode (CSE) and TCSE, respectively. Our study reveals that BLG based solar cell shows better efficiency of 24.85% than Ag-based cell (21.44%), in all of the critical aspects, including generation rate, recombination rate, electric field, potential and quantum efficiency. Further BLG based cell exhibits pronounce rectifying behavior, low saturation current, and good turn-on voltage while studying in dark.

The next generation CdTe technology- Substrate foil based solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Ferekides, Chris [Univ. of South Florida, Tampa, FL (United States)

2017-03-22

The main objective of this project was the development of one of the most promising Photovoltaic (PV) materials CdTe into a versatile, cost effective, and high throughput technology, by demonstrating substrate devices on foil substrates using high throughput fabrication conditions. The typical CdTe cell is of the superstrate configuration where the solar cell is fabricated on a glass superstrate by the sequential deposition of a TCO, n-type heterojunction partner, p-CdTe absorber, and back contact. Large glass modules are heavy and present significant challenges during manufacturing (uniform heating, etc.). If a substrate CdTe cell could be developed (the main goal of this project) a roll-to-toll high throughput technology could be developed.

Performance of Photovoltaic Modules of Different Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ankita Gaur

2013-01-01

Full Text Available In this paper, an attempt of performance evaluation of semitransparent and opaque photovoltaic (PV modules of different generation solar cells, having the maximum efficiencies reported in the literature at standard test conditions (STC, has been carried out particularly for the months of January and June. The outdoor performance is also evaluated for the commercially available semitransparent and opaque PV modules. Annual electrical energy, capitalized cost, annualized uniform cost (unacost, and cost per unit electrical energy for both types of solar modules, namely, semitransparent and opaque have also been computed along with their characteristics curves. Semitransparent PV modules have shown higher efficiencies compared to the opaque ones. Calculations show that for the PV modules made in laboratory, CdTe exhibits the maximum annual electrical energy generation resulting into minimum cost per unit electrical energy, whereas a-Si/nc-Si possesses the maximum annual electrical energy generation giving minimum cost per unit electrical energy when commercially available solar modules are concerned. CIGS has shown the lowest capitalized cost over all other PV technologies.

Quantum Dots for Solar Cell Application

Science.gov (United States)

Poudyal, Uma

Solar energy has been anticipated as the most important and reliable source of renewable energy to address the ever-increasing energy demand. To harvest solar energy efficiently, diverse kinds of solar cells have been studied. Among these, quantum dot sensitized solar cells have been an interesting group of solar cells mainly due to tunable, size-dependent electronic and optical properties of quantum dots. Moreover, doping these quantum dots with transition metal elements such as Mn opens avenue for improved performance of solar cells as well as for spin based technologies. In this dissertation, Mn-doped CdSe QDs (Mn-CdSe) have been synthesized by Successive Ionic Layer Adsorption and Reaction (SILAR) method. They are used in solar cells to study the effect of Mn doping in the performance of solar cells. Incident photon to current-conversion efficiency (IPCE) is used to record the effect of Mn-doping. Intensity modulated photovoltage and photocurrent spectroscopy (IMVS/PS) has been used to study the carrier dynamics in these solar cells. Additionally, the magnetic properties of Mn-CdSe QDs is studied and its possible origin is discussed. Moreover, CdS/CdSe QDs have been used to study the effect of liquid, gel and solid electrolyte in the performance and stability of the solar cells. Using IPCE spectra, the time decay measurements are presented and the possible reactions between the QD and the electrolytes are explained.

Photovoltaic power generation system with photovoltaic cells as bypass diodes

Science.gov (United States)

Lentine, Anthony L.; Nielson, Gregory N.; Tauke-Pedretti, Anna; Cruz-Campa, Jose Luis; Okandan, Murat

2017-11-28

A photovoltaic power generation system that includes a solar panel is described herein. The solar panel includes a photovoltaic sub-module, which includes a group of microsystem enabled photovoltaic cells. The group includes a first string of photovoltaic cells, a second string of photovoltaic cells, and a differing photovoltaic cell. Photovoltaic cells in the first string are electrically connected in series, and photovoltaic cells in the second string are electrically connected in series. Further, the first string of photovoltaic cells, the second string of photovoltaic cells, and the differing photovoltaic cell are electrically connected in parallel. Moreover, the differing photovoltaic cell is used as a bypass diode for the first string of photovoltaic cells and the second string of photovoltaic cells.

Solar generation: a blueprint for growing the PV market

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Cameron, M.; Stierstorfer, J.; Teske, S.; Aubrey, C.

2001-01-01

The rapid growth of the solar electricity market is discussed. The European Photovoltaic Industry Association and Greenpeace have recently collaborated on a long-term forecast of the global solar electricity market up to 2020 with predictions up to 2040; the conclusions from their joint study are the subject of this article. The paper is presented under the main sub-headings of (i) background to the collaboration; (ii) the Greenpeace perspective; (iii) the impact of solar electricity in the lives of consumers and job-seekers born today; (iv) solar generation-methods and assumptions (v) market growth rates; (vi) electricity generation; (vii) carbon dioxide emissions; (viii) projection to 2040; (ix) key results of the EPIA/Greenpeace analysis; (x) solar electricity as a vehicle for job creation and (xi) creating the conditions for optimizing the impact of solar electricity on future generations. A chart shows solar electricity job creation potential 2000-2020

The micro-optic photovoltaic behavior of solar cell along with microlens curved glass substrate

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Xie, Jin; Wu, Keke; Cheng, Jian; Li, Ping; Zheng, Jiahua

2015-01-01

Highlights: • A microlens array may be micro-ground on curved photovoltaic glass substrate. • Its micro-optical structure absorbs and scatters the inclined light to solar cell. • It increases conversion efficiency and fill factor in weak and inclined lights. • It improves electricity generation by about 4 times in scattered cloudy daylight. • It produces stronger electricity generation in cloudy day than in sunny day. - Abstract: A hybrid of microlens structure and curved surface may produce high value-added micro-optic performance. Hence, the microlens array is proposed on macro curved glass substrate of thin film solar cell. The objective is to understand how the micro-optic behavior of microlens curved array influences indoor power conversion efficiency and outdoor electricity generation. First, the absorptivities of visible light and infrared light were analyzed in connection with the curved microlens sizes; then the microlens curved glass substrate was fabricated by a Computer Numerical Control (CNC) micro-grinding with micro diamond wheel V-tip; finally, its photovoltaic properties and electricity generation were measured, respectively. It is shown that the microlens curved surface may strongly absorb and scatter light to solar cell. It increases the absorptivity of visible light against plane surface, but it decreases the one of infrared light against microlens surface. When it is applied to solar cell, it enhances the power conversion efficiency by 3.4–10.6% under oblique illumination. When it is applied to solar device, it increases the electricity generation of daylight by 119–106% against microlens surface and by 260–419% against traditional plane surface, respectively. The surprising finding is that it produces much larger electricity generation during cloudy day than during sunny day, but traditional plane surface does not so

Hybrid Perovskites: Prospects for Concentrator Solar Cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Lin, Qianqian; Wang, Zhiping; Snaith, Henry J; Johnston, Michael B; Herz, Laura M

2018-04-01

Perovskite solar cells have shown a meteoric rise of power conversion efficiency and a steady pace of improvements in their stability of operation. Such rapid progress has triggered research into approaches that can boost efficiencies beyond the Shockley-Queisser limit stipulated for a single-junction cell under normal solar illumination conditions. The tandem solar cell architecture is one concept here that has recently been successfully implemented. However, the approach of solar concentration has not been sufficiently explored so far for perovskite photovoltaics, despite its frequent use in the area of inorganic semiconductor solar cells. Here, the prospects of hybrid perovskites are assessed for use in concentrator solar cells. Solar cell performance parameters are theoretically predicted as a function of solar concentration levels, based on representative assumptions of charge-carrier recombination and extraction rates in the device. It is demonstrated that perovskite solar cells can fundamentally exhibit appreciably higher energy-conversion efficiencies under solar concentration, where they are able to exceed the Shockley-Queisser limit and exhibit strongly elevated open-circuit voltages. It is therefore concluded that sufficient material and device stability under increased illumination levels will be the only significant challenge to perovskite concentrator solar cell applications.

Industrial n-type solar cells with >20% cell efficiency

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Romijn, I.G.; Anker, J.; Burgers, A.R.; Gutjahr, A.; Koppes, M.; Kossen, E.J.; Lamers, M.W.P.E.; Heurtault, Benoit; Saynova-Oosterling, D.S.; Tool, C.J.J. [ECN Solar Energy, Petten (Netherlands)

2013-03-15

To realize high efficiencies at low costs, ECN has developed the n-Pasha solar cell concept. The n-Pasha cell concept is a bifacial solar cell concept on n-Cz base material, with which average efficiencies of above 20% have been demonstrated. In this paper recent developments at ECN to improve the cost of ownership (lower Euro/Wp) of the n-Pasha cell concept are discussed. Two main drivers for the manufacturing costs of n-type solar cells are addressed: the n-type Cz silicon material and the silver consumption. We show that a large resistivity range between 2 and 8 cm can be tolerated for high cell efficiency, and that the costs due to the silver metallization can be significantly reduced while increasing the solar cell efficiency. Combining the improved efficiency and cost reduction makes the n-Pasha cell concept a very cost effective solution to manufacture high efficient solar cells and modules.

Atomic layer deposition for photovoltaics: applications and prospects for solar cell manufacturing

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Van Delft, J A; Garcia-Alonso, D; Kessels, W M M

2012-01-01

Atomic layer deposition (ALD) is a vapour-phase deposition technique capable of depositing high quality, uniform and conformal thin films at relatively low temperatures. These outstanding properties can be employed to face processing challenges for various types of next-generation solar cells; hence, ALD for photovoltaics (PV) has attracted great interest in academic and industrial research in recent years. In this review, the recent progress of ALD layers applied to various solar cell concepts and their future prospects are discussed. Crystalline silicon (c-Si), copper indium gallium selenide (CIGS) and dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) benefit from the application of ALD surface passivation layers, buffer layers and barrier layers, respectively. ALD films are also excellent moisture permeation barriers that have been successfully used to encapsulate flexible CIGS and organic photovoltaic (OPV) cells. Furthermore, some emerging applications of the ALD method in solar cell research are reviewed. The potential of ALD for solar cells manufacturing is discussed, and the current status of high-throughput ALD equipment development is presented. ALD is on the verge of being introduced in the PV industry and it is expected that it will be part of the standard solar cell manufacturing equipment in the near future. (paper)

Employing Si solar cell technology to increase efficiency of ultra-thin Cu(In,Ga)Se2 solar cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Vermang, Bart; Wätjen, Jörn Timo; Fjällström, Viktor; Rostvall, Fredrik; Edoff, Marika; Kotipalli, Ratan; Henry, Frederic; Flandre, Denis

2014-10-01

Reducing absorber layer thickness below 500 nm in regular Cu(In,Ga)Se 2 (CIGS) solar cells decreases cell efficiency considerably, as both short-circuit current and open-circuit voltage are reduced because of incomplete absorption and high Mo/CIGS rear interface recombination. In this work, an innovative rear cell design is developed to avoid both effects: a highly reflective rear surface passivation layer with nano-sized local point contact openings is employed to enhance rear internal reflection and decrease the rear surface recombination velocity significantly, as compared with a standard Mo/CIGS rear interface. The formation of nano-sphere shaped precipitates in chemical bath deposition of CdS is used to generate nano-sized point contact openings. Evaporation of MgF 2 coated with a thin atomic layer deposited Al 2 O 3 layer, or direct current magnetron sputtering of Al 2 O 3 are used as rear surface passivation layers. Rear internal reflection is enhanced substantially by the increased thickness of the passivation layer, and also the rear surface recombination velocity is reduced at the Al 2 O 3 /CIGS rear interface. (MgF 2 /)Al 2 O 3 rear surface passivated ultra-thin CIGS solar cells are fabricated, showing an increase in short circuit current and open circuit voltage compared to unpassivated reference cells with equivalent CIGS thickness. Accordingly, average solar cell efficiencies of 13.5% are realized for 385 nm thick CIGS absorber layers, compared with 9.1% efficiency for the corresponding unpassivated reference cells.

Employing Si solar cell technology to increase efficiency of ultra-thin Cu(In,Ga)Se2 solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Vermang, Bart; Wätjen, Jörn Timo; Fjällström, Viktor; Rostvall, Fredrik; Edoff, Marika; Kotipalli, Ratan; Henry, Frederic; Flandre, Denis

2014-01-01

Reducing absorber layer thickness below 500 nm in regular Cu(In,Ga)Se2 (CIGS) solar cells decreases cell efficiency considerably, as both short-circuit current and open-circuit voltage are reduced because of incomplete absorption and high Mo/CIGS rear interface recombination. In this work, an innovative rear cell design is developed to avoid both effects: a highly reflective rear surface passivation layer with nano-sized local point contact openings is employed to enhance rear internal reflection and decrease the rear surface recombination velocity significantly, as compared with a standard Mo/CIGS rear interface. The formation of nano-sphere shaped precipitates in chemical bath deposition of CdS is used to generate nano-sized point contact openings. Evaporation of MgF2 coated with a thin atomic layer deposited Al2O3 layer, or direct current magnetron sputtering of Al2O3 are used as rear surface passivation layers. Rear internal reflection is enhanced substantially by the increased thickness of the passivation layer, and also the rear surface recombination velocity is reduced at the Al2O3/CIGS rear interface. (MgF2/)Al2O3 rear surface passivated ultra-thin CIGS solar cells are fabricated, showing an increase in short circuit current and open circuit voltage compared to unpassivated reference cells with equivalent CIGS thickness. Accordingly, average solar cell efficiencies of 13.5% are realized for 385 nm thick CIGS absorber layers, compared with 9.1% efficiency for the corresponding unpassivated reference cells. PMID:26300619

Polymethylmethacrylate-based luminescent solar concentrators with bottom-mounted solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Zhang, Yi; Sun, Song; Kang, Rui; Zhang, Jun; Zhang, Ningning; Yan, Wenhao; Xie, Wei; Ding, Jianjun; Bao, Jun; Gao, Chen

2015-01-01

Graphical abstract: - Highlights: • Bottom-mounted luminescent solar concentrators on dye-doped plates were studied. • The mechanism of transport process was proposed. • The fabricated luminescent solar concentrator achieved a gain of 1.38. • Power conversion efficiency of 5.03% was obtained with cell area coverage of 27%. • The lowest cost per watt of $1.89 was optimized with cell area coverage of 18%. - Abstract: Luminescent solar concentrators offer an attractive approach to concentrate sunlight economically without tracking, but the narrow absorption band of luminescent materials hinders their further development. This paper describes bottom-mounted luminescent solar concentrators on dye-doped polymethylmethacrylate plates that absorb not only the waveguided light but also the transmitted sunlight and partial fluorescent light in the escape cone. A series of bottom-mounted luminescent solar concentrators with size of 78 mm × 78 mm × 7 mm were fabricated and their gain and power conversion efficiency were investigated. The transport process of the waveguided light and the relationship between the bottom-mounted cells were studied to optimize the performance of the device. The bottom-mounted luminescent solar concentrator with cell area coverage of 9% displayed a cell gain of 1.38, to our best knowledge, which is the highest value for dye-doped polymethylmethacrylate plate luminescent solar concentrators. Power conversion efficiency as high as 5.03% was obtained with cell area coverage of 27%. Furthermore, the bottom-mounted luminescent solar concentrator was found to have a lowest cost per watt of $1.89 with cell area coverage of 18%. These results suggested that the fabricated bottom-mounted luminescent solar concentrator may have a potential in low-cost building integrated photovoltaic application

Recent Advances in Organic Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Thomas Kietzke

2007-01-01

Full Text Available Solar cells based on organic semiconductors have attracted much attention. The thickness of the active layer of organic solar cells is typically only 100 nm thin, which is about 1000 times thinner than for crystalline silicon solar cells and still 10 times thinner than for current inorganic thin film cells. The low material consumption per area and the easy processing of organic semiconductors offer a huge potential for low cost large area solar cells. However, to compete with inorganic solar cells the efficiency of organic solar cells has to be improved by a factor of 2-3. Several organic semiconducting materials have been investigated so far, but the optimum material still has to be designed. Similar as for organic light emitting devices (OLED small molecules are competing with polymers to become the material of choice. After a general introduction into the device structures and operational principles of organic solar cells the three different basic types (all polymer based, all small molecules based and small molecules mixed with polymers are described in detail in this review. For each kind the current state of research is described and the best of class reported efficiencies are listed.

Incomplete Exciton Harvesting from Fullerenes in Bulk Heterojunction Solar Cells

KAUST Repository

Burkhard, George F.

2009-12-09

We investigate the internal quantum efficiencies (IQEs) of high efficiency poly-3-hexylthiophene:[6,6]-phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester (P3HT:PCBM) solar cells and find them to be lower at wavelengths where the PCBM absorbs. Because the exciton diffusion length in PCBM is too small, excitons generated in PCBM decay before reaching the donor-acceptor interface. This result has implications for most state of the art organic solar cells, since all of the most efficient devices use fullerenes as electron acceptors. © 2009 American Chemical Society.

Incomplete Exciton Harvesting from Fullerenes in Bulk Heterojunction Solar Cells

KAUST Repository

Burkhard, George F.; Hoke, Eric T.; Scully, Shawn R.; McGehee, Michael D.

2009-01-01

We investigate the internal quantum efficiencies (IQEs) of high efficiency poly-3-hexylthiophene:[6,6]-phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester (P3HT:PCBM) solar cells and find them to be lower at wavelengths where the PCBM absorbs. Because the exciton diffusion length in PCBM is too small, excitons generated in PCBM decay before reaching the donor-acceptor interface. This result has implications for most state of the art organic solar cells, since all of the most efficient devices use fullerenes as electron acceptors. © 2009 American Chemical Society.

Semiconductor materials for solar photovoltaic cells

CERN Document Server

Wong-Ng, Winnie; Bhattacharya, Raghu

2016-01-01

This book reviews the current status of semiconductor materials for conversion of sunlight to electricity, and highlights advances in both basic science and manufacturing.  Photovoltaic (PV) solar electric technology will be a significant contributor to world energy supplies when reliable, efficient PV power products are manufactured in large volumes at low cost.  Expert chapters cover the full range of semiconductor materials for solar-to-electricity conversion, from crystalline silicon and amorphous silicon to cadmium telluride, copper indium gallium sulfide selenides, dye sensitized solar cells, organic solar cells, and environmentally friendly copper zinc tin sulfide selenides. The latest methods for synthesis and characterization of solar cell materials are described, together with techniques for measuring solar cell efficiency. Semiconductor Materials for Solar Photovoltaic Cells presents the current state of the art as well as key details about future strategies to increase the efficiency and reduce ...

Material challenges for solar cells in the twenty-first century: directions in emerging technologies.

Science.gov (United States)

Almosni, Samy; Delamarre, Amaury; Jehl, Zacharie; Suchet, Daniel; Cojocaru, Ludmila; Giteau, Maxime; Behaghel, Benoit; Julian, Anatole; Ibrahim, Camille; Tatry, Léa; Wang, Haibin; Kubo, Takaya; Uchida, Satoshi; Segawa, Hiroshi; Miyashita, Naoya; Tamaki, Ryo; Shoji, Yasushi; Yoshida, Katsuhisa; Ahsan, Nazmul; Watanabe, Kentaro; Inoue, Tomoyuki; Sugiyama, Masakazu; Nakano, Yoshiaki; Hamamura, Tomofumi; Toupance, Thierry; Olivier, Céline; Chambon, Sylvain; Vignau, Laurence; Geffroy, Camille; Cloutet, Eric; Hadziioannou, Georges; Cavassilas, Nicolas; Rale, Pierre; Cattoni, Andrea; Collin, Stéphane; Gibelli, François; Paire, Myriam; Lombez, Laurent; Aureau, Damien; Bouttemy, Muriel; Etcheberry, Arnaud; Okada, Yoshitaka; Guillemoles, Jean-François

2018-01-01

Photovoltaic generation has stepped up within the last decade from outsider status to one of the important contributors of the ongoing energy transition, with about 1.7% of world electricity provided by solar cells. Progress in materials and production processes has played an important part in this development. Yet, there are many challenges before photovoltaics could provide clean, abundant, and cheap energy. Here, we review this research direction, with a focus on the results obtained within a Japan-French cooperation program, NextPV, working on promising solar cell technologies. The cooperation was focused on efficient photovoltaic devices, such as multijunction, ultrathin, intermediate band, and hot-carrier solar cells, and on printable solar cell materials such as colloidal quantum dots.

Generation of Electric Energy and Desalinating Water from Solar Energy and the Oceans Hydropower

Science.gov (United States)

Elfikky, Niazi

Brief.All warnings and fears about the environment in our Earth planet due to the serious effects of the industrial revolution were certainly predicted early. But the eager contest and the powerful desire for more profits beside the human interest for welfare and development closed all minds about the expected severe destuctive impacts on our earth planet. Also, we have to remember that the majority of the African, Asian and Latin American countries are still in the first stage of their development and if they will be left to generate all their demand of energy by the conventional machine e.g (Fossil Fuel, Biofuel and Nuclear Fuel), then our Earth planet will confront an endless and ceasless severe destructive impacts due to the encroach of the released hot Carbon Doxide and hot vapours of Acids which will never forgive any fruitful aspect in our Earth Planet from destruction. 1. Importance of the New Project. Building the Extra cheap, clean Power plants with safe and smooth Operation in addition to the long life time in service for generating enough and plentiful electric energy the sustainable renwable resources will invigorate the foresaking of all Nuclear, Fossil and Biofuel power plants to avoide the nuclear hazards and stop releasing the hot carbon doxide, hot acids for the recovery of our ill environment. Also, the main sustainable, renewable, and cheap resources for generating the bulky capacity of the electric energy in our project are the Sun and the Oceans in addition to all Seas Surrounding all Continents in our Earth planet. Therefore, our recourses are so much enormous plentiful, clean, and renewable. 2. .Generation of Electricity from Solar Energy by Photovoltiac Cells (PVCs) or Concentrated Solar Power (CSP). Characteristics of Photovoltiac Cells (PVCs). It is working only by Sun's Light (Light photons) and its efficiency will decrease as the Solar Thermal Radiation will increase, i.e. as the temerature of the Solar Voltiac will increase, its output

Development, Qualification and Production of Space Solar Cells with 30% EOL Efficiency

Science.gov (United States)

Guter, Wolfgang; Ebel, Lars; Fuhrmann, Daniel; Kostler, Wolfgang; Meusel, Matthias

2014-08-01

AZUR SPACE's latest qualified solar cell product 3G30-advanced provides a high end-of-life (EOL) efficiency of 27.8% for 5E14 (1 MeV e-/cm2) at low production costs. In order to further reduce the mass, the 3G30-advanced was thinned down to as thin as 20 μm and tested in space. Next generation solar cells must exceed the EOL efficiency of the 3G30-advanced and therefore will utilize the excess current of the Ge subcell. This can be achieved by a metamorphic cell concept. While average beginning-of-life efficiencies above 31% have already been demonstrated with upright metamorphic triple-junction cells, AZUR's next generation product will comprise a metamorphic 4- junction device targeting 30% EOL.

Semi-transparent polymer solar cells with excellent sub-bandgap transmission for third generation photovoltaics

KAUST Repository

Beiley, Zach M.

2013-10-07

Semi-transparent organic photovoltaics are of interest for a variety of photovoltaic applications, including solar windows and hybrid tandem photovoltaics. The figure shows a photograph of our semi-transparent solar cell, which has a power conversion efficiency of 5.0%, with an above bandgap transmission of 34% and a sub-bandgap transmission of 81%. © 2013 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Development of Space Qualified Microlens Arrays for Solar Cells Used on Satellite Power Systems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ömer Faruk Keser

2017-08-01

Full Text Available The power system, one of the main systems of satellite, provides energy required for the satellite. Solar cells are also the most used energy source in the power system. The third generation multi-junction solar cells are known as the ones with highest performance. One of the methods to increase the performance of the solar cells is anti-reflective surface coatings with the Micro Lens Array-MLA. It's expected that satellite technologies has high power efficiency and low mass. The space environment has many effects like atomic oxygen, radiation and thermal cycles. Researches for increasing the solar cells performance shows that MLA coated solar cell has increased light absorption performance and less cell heating with very low additional mass. However, it is established that few studies on MLA coatings of solar cells are not applicable on space platforms. In this study, the process of development of MLA which is convenient to space power systems is investigated in a methodological way. In this context, a method which is developed based on MLA coatings of multi-junction solar cells for satellite power systems is presented.

Analysis of Si/SiGe Heterostructure Solar Cell

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ashish Kumar Singh

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Sunlight is the largest source of carbon-neutral energy. Large amount of energy, about 4.3 × 1020 J/hr (Lewis, 2005, is radiated because of nuclear fusion reaction by sun, but it is unfortunate that it is not exploited to its maximum level. Various photovoltaic researches are ongoing to find low cost, and highly efficient solar cell to fulfil looming energy crisis around the globe. Thin film solar cell along with enhanced absorption property will be the best, so combination of SiGe alloy is considered. The paper presented here consists of a numerical model of Si/Si1-xGex heterostructure solar cell. The research has investigated characteristics such as short circuit current density (Jsc, generation rate (G, absorption coefficient (α, and open circuit voltage (Voc with optimal Ge concentration. The addition of Ge content to Si layer will affect the property of material and can be calculated with the use of Vegard’s law. Due to this, short circuit current density increases.

Performance enhancement of thin film silicon solar cells based on distributed Bragg reflector & diffraction grating

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

R. S. Dubey

2014-12-01

Full Text Available The influence of various designing parameters were investigated and explored for high performance solar cells. Single layer grating based solar cell of 50 μm thickness gives maximum efficiency up to 24 % whereas same efficiency is achieved with the use of three bilayers grating based solar cell of 30 μm thickness. Remarkably, bilayer grating based solar cell design not only gives broadband absorption but also enhancement in efficiency with reduced cell thickness requirement. This absorption enhancement is attributed to the high reflection and diffraction from DBR and grating respectively. The obtained short-circuit current were 29.6, 32.9, 34.6 and 36.05 mA/cm2 of 5, 10, 20 and 30 μm cell thicknesses respectively. These presented designing efforts would be helpful to design and realize new generation of solar cells.

Mixed Domains Enhance Charge Generation and Extraction in Bulk-Heterojunction Solar Cells with Small-Molecule Donors

KAUST Repository

Alqahtani, Obaid; Babics, Maxime; Gorenflot, Julien; Savikhin, Victoria; Ferron, Thomas; Balawi, Ahmed H.; Paulke, Andreas; Kan, Zhipeng; Pope, Michael; Clulow, Andrew J.; Wolf, Jannic Sebastian; Burn, Paul L.; Gentle, Ian R.; Neher, Dieter; Toney, Michael F.; Laquai, Fré dé ric; Beaujuge, Pierre; Collins, Brian A.

2018-01-01

The interplay between nanomorphology and efficiency of polymer-fullerene bulk-heterojunction (BHJ) solar cells has been the subject of intense research, but the generality of these concepts for small-molecule (SM) BHJs remains unclear. Here, the relation between performance; charge generation, recombination, and extraction dynamics; and nanomorphology achievable with two SM donors benzo[1,2-b:4,5-b]dithiophene-pyrido[3,4-b]-pyrazine BDT(PPTh), namely SM1 and SM2, differing by their side-chains, are examined as a function of solution additive composition. The results show that the additive 1,8-diiodooctane acts as a plasticizer in the blends, increases domain size, and promotes ordering/crystallinity. Surprisingly, the system with high domain purity (SM1) exhibits both poor exciton harvesting and severe charge trapping, alleviated only slightly with increased crystallinity. In contrast, the system consisting of mixed domains and lower crystallinity (SM2) shows both excellent exciton harvesting and low charge recombination losses. Importantly, the onset of large, pure crystallites in the latter (SM2) system reduces efficiency, pointing to possible differences in the ideal morphologies for SM-based BHJ solar cells compared with polymer-fullerene devices. In polymer-based systems, tie chains between pure polymer crystals establish a continuous charge transport network, whereas SM-based active layers may in some cases require mixed domains that enable both aggregation and charge percolation to the electrodes.

Mixed Domains Enhance Charge Generation and Extraction in Bulk-Heterojunction Solar Cells with Small-Molecule Donors

KAUST Repository

Alqahtani, Obaid

2018-03-25

The interplay between nanomorphology and efficiency of polymer-fullerene bulk-heterojunction (BHJ) solar cells has been the subject of intense research, but the generality of these concepts for small-molecule (SM) BHJs remains unclear. Here, the relation between performance; charge generation, recombination, and extraction dynamics; and nanomorphology achievable with two SM donors benzo[1,2-b:4,5-b]dithiophene-pyrido[3,4-b]-pyrazine BDT(PPTh), namely SM1 and SM2, differing by their side-chains, are examined as a function of solution additive composition. The results show that the additive 1,8-diiodooctane acts as a plasticizer in the blends, increases domain size, and promotes ordering/crystallinity. Surprisingly, the system with high domain purity (SM1) exhibits both poor exciton harvesting and severe charge trapping, alleviated only slightly with increased crystallinity. In contrast, the system consisting of mixed domains and lower crystallinity (SM2) shows both excellent exciton harvesting and low charge recombination losses. Importantly, the onset of large, pure crystallites in the latter (SM2) system reduces efficiency, pointing to possible differences in the ideal morphologies for SM-based BHJ solar cells compared with polymer-fullerene devices. In polymer-based systems, tie chains between pure polymer crystals establish a continuous charge transport network, whereas SM-based active layers may in some cases require mixed domains that enable both aggregation and charge percolation to the electrodes.

Optimal Solar PV Arrays Integration for Distributed Generation

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Omitaomu, Olufemi A [ORNL; Li, Xueping [University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UTK)

2012-01-01

Solar photovoltaic (PV) systems hold great potential for distributed energy generation by installing PV panels on rooftops of residential and commercial buildings. Yet challenges arise along with the variability and non-dispatchability of the PV systems that affect the stability of the grid and the economics of the PV system. This paper investigates the integration of PV arrays for distributed generation applications by identifying a combination of buildings that will maximize solar energy output and minimize system variability. Particularly, we propose mean-variance optimization models to choose suitable rooftops for PV integration based on Markowitz mean-variance portfolio selection model. We further introduce quantity and cardinality constraints to result in a mixed integer quadratic programming problem. Case studies based on real data are presented. An efficient frontier is obtained for sample data that allows decision makers to choose a desired solar energy generation level with a comfortable variability tolerance level. Sensitivity analysis is conducted to show the tradeoffs between solar PV energy generation potential and variability.

Observation of the subgap optical absorption in polymer-fullerene blend solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Goris, L.; Poruba, A.; Hod'akova, L.; Vanecek, M.; Haenen, K.; Nesladek, M.; Wagner, P.; Vanderzande, D.; Schepper, L. de; Manca, J. V.

2006-01-01

This letter reports on highly sensitive optical absorption measurements on organic donor-acceptor solar cells, using Fourier-transform photocurrent spectroscopy (FTPS). The spectra cover an unprecedented dynamic range of eight to nine orders of magnitude making it possible to detect defect and disorder related sub-band gap transitions. Direct measurements on fully encapsulated solar cells with an active layer of poly[2-methoxy-5-(3 ' ,7 ' -dimethyl-octyloxy)]-p-phenylene-vinylene: (6,6)-phenyl-C61-butyric-acid (1:4 weight ratio) enabled a study of the intrinsic defect generation due to UV illumination. Solar cell temperature annealing effects in poly(3-hexylthiophene):PCBM (1:2 weight ratio) cells and the induced morphological changes are related to the changes in the absorption spectrum, as determined with FTPS

Lifetime enhancement for multiphoton absorption in intermediate band solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Bezerra, Anibal T; Studart, Nelson

2017-01-01

A semiconductor structure consisting of two coupled quantum wells embedded into the intrinsic region of a p – i–n junction is proposed as an intermediate band solar cell with a photon ratchet state, which would lead to increasing the cell efficiency. The conduction subband of the right-hand side quantum well works as the intermediated band, whereas the excited conduction subband of the left-hand side quantum well operates as the ratchet state. The photoelectrons in the intermediate band are scattered through the thin wells barrier and accumulated into the ratchet subband. A rate equation model for describing the charge transport properties is presented. The efficiency of the current generation is analyzed by studying the occupation of the wells subbands, taking into account the charge dynamic behavior provided by the electrical contacts connected to the cell. The current generation efficiency depends essentially from the relations between the generation, recombination rates and the scattering rate to the ratchet state. The inclusion of the ratchet states led to both an increase and a decrease in the cell current depending on the transition rates. This suggests that the coupling between the intermediate band and the ratchet state is a key point in developing an efficient solar cell. (paper)

Lifetime enhancement for multiphoton absorption in intermediate band solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Bezerra, Anibal T.; Studart, Nelson

2017-08-01

A semiconductor structure consisting of two coupled quantum wells embedded into the intrinsic region of a p-i-n junction is proposed as an intermediate band solar cell with a photon ratchet state, which would lead to increasing the cell efficiency. The conduction subband of the right-hand side quantum well works as the intermediated band, whereas the excited conduction subband of the left-hand side quantum well operates as the ratchet state. The photoelectrons in the intermediate band are scattered through the thin wells barrier and accumulated into the ratchet subband. A rate equation model for describing the charge transport properties is presented. The efficiency of the current generation is analyzed by studying the occupation of the wells subbands, taking into account the charge dynamic behavior provided by the electrical contacts connected to the cell. The current generation efficiency depends essentially from the relations between the generation, recombination rates and the scattering rate to the ratchet state. The inclusion of the ratchet states led to both an increase and a decrease in the cell current depending on the transition rates. This suggests that the coupling between the intermediate band and the ratchet state is a key point in developing an efficient solar cell.

Power fluctuations suppression of stand-alone hybrid generation combining solar photovoltaic/wind turbine and fuel cell systems

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ahmed, Nabil A.; Miyatake, Masafumi; Al-Othman, A.K.

2008-01-01

In this paper a hybrid energy system combining variable speed wind turbine, solar photovoltaic and fuel cell generation systems is presented to supply continuous power to residential power applications as stand-alone loads. The wind and photovoltaic systems are used as main energy sources while the fuel cell is used as secondary or back-up energy source. Three individual dc-dc boost converters are used to control the power flow to the load. A simple and cost effective control with dc-dc converters is used for maximum power point tracking and hence maximum power extracting from the wind turbine and the solar photovoltaic systems. The hybrid system is sized to power a typical 2 kW/150 V dc load as telecommunication power plants or ac residential power applications in isolated islands continuously throughout the year. The results show that even when the sun and wind are not available; the system is reliable and available and it can supply high-quality power to the load. The simulation results which proved the accuracy of the proposed controllers are given to demonstrate the availability of the proposed system in this paper. Also, a complete description of the management and control system is presented

Quantum-Tuned Multijunction Solar Cells

Science.gov (United States)

Koleilat, Ghada I.

Multijunction solar cells made from a combination of CQDs of differing sizes and thus bandgaps are a promising means by which to increase the energy harvested from the Sun's broad spectrum. In this dissertation, we first report the systematic engineering of 1.6 eV PbS CQD solar cells, optimal as the front cell responsible for visible wavelength harvesting in tandem photovoltaics. We rationally optimize each of the device's collecting electrodes---the heterointerface with electron accepting TiO2 and the deep-work-function hole-collecting MoO3 for ohmic contact---for maximum efficiency. Room-temperature processing enables flexible substrates, and permits tandem solar cells that integrate a small-bandgap back cell atop a low thermal-budget larger-bandgap front cell. We report an electrode strategy that enables a depleted heterojunction CQD PV device to be fabricated entirely at room temperature. We develop a two-layer donor-supply electrode (DSE) in which a highly doped, shallow work function layer supplies a high density of free electrons to an ultrathin TiO2 layer via charge-transfer doping. Using the DSE we build all-room-temperature-processed small-bandgap (1 eV) colloidal quantum dot solar cells suitable for use as the back junction in tandem solar cells. We further report in this work the first efficient CQD tandem solar cells. We use a graded recombination layer (GRL) to provide a progression of work functions from the hole-accepting electrode in the bottom cell to the electron-accepting electrode in the top cell. The recombination layers must allow the hole current from one cell to recombine, with high efficiency and low voltage loss, with the electron current from the next cell. We conclude our dissertation by presenting the generalized conditions for design of efficient graded recombination layer solar devices. We demonstrate a family of new GRL designs experimentally and highlight the benefits of the progression of dopings and work functions in the

Theoretical investigation on heterojunction solar cell

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Prema, K.; Geetha, K.

1986-11-01

The study of thin film solar cells has proved that the surface is rough. A two-dimensional method based on the integral equation technique to analyse thin film solar cells has been developed by DeMey et al. In this paper we present our analysis of a thin film solar cell using the above techniques. Variation of the minority carrier concentration, the saturation current and the junction current of the solar cell with surface roughness is presented. (author). 8 refs, 4 figs

Tuning the colors of c-Si solar cells by exploiting plasmonic effects

Science.gov (United States)

Peharz, G.; Grosschädl, B.; Prietl, C.; Waldhauser, W.; Wenzl, F. P.

2016-09-01

The color of a crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar cell is mainly determined by its anti-reflective coating. This is a lambda/4 coating made from a transparent dielectric material. The thickness of the anti-reflective coating is optimized for maximal photocurrent generation, resulting in the typical blue or black colors of c-Si solar cells. However, for building-integrated photovoltaic (BiPV) applications the color of the solar cells is demanded to be tunable - ideally by a cheap and flexible coating process on standard (low cost) c-Si solar cells. Such a coating can be realized by applying plasmonic coloring which is a rapidly growing technology for high-quality color filtering and rendering for different fields of application (displays, imaging,…). In this contribution, we present results of an approach for tuning the color of standard industrial c-Si solar cells that is based on coating them with metallic nano-particles. In particular, thin films (green and brownish/red. The position of the resonance peak in the reflection spectrum was found to be almost independent from the angle of incidence. This low angular sensitivity is a clear advantage compared to alternative color tuning methods, for which additional dielectric thin films are deposited on c-Si solar cells.

Rehydrating dye sensitized solar cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Christian Hellert

2017-05-01

Full Text Available Dye sensitized solar cells (DSSCs are silicon free, simply producible solar cells. Longevity, however, is a longstanding problem for DSSCs. Due to liquid electrolytes being commonly used, evaporation of the electrolyte causes a dramatic drop in electric output as cells continue to be used unmaintained. Stopping evaporation has been tried in different ways in the past, albeit with differing degrees of success. In a recent project, a different route was chosen, exploring ways of revitalizing DSSCs after varying periods of usage. For this, we focused on rehydration of the cells using distilled water as well as the electrolyte contained in the cells. The results show a significant influence of these rehydration procedures on the solar cell efficiency. In possible applications of DSSCs in tents etc., morning dew may thus be used for rehydration of solar cells. Refillable DSSCs can also be used in tropical climates or specific types of farms and greenhouses where high humidity serves the purpose of rehydrating DSSCs.

Graphene as transparent and current spreading electrode in silicon solar cell

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sanjay K. Behura

2014-11-01

Full Text Available Fabricated bi-layer graphene (BLG has been studied as transparent and current spreading electrode (TCSE for silicon solar cell, using TCAD-Silvaco 2D simulation. We have carried out comparative study using both Ag grids and BLG as current spreading electrode (CSE and TCSE, respectively. Our study reveals that BLG based solar cell shows better efficiency of 24.85% than Ag-based cell (21.44%, in all of the critical aspects, including generation rate, recombination rate, electric field, potential and quantum efficiency. Further BLG based cell exhibits pronounce rectifying behavior, low saturation current, and good turn-on voltage while studying in dark.

TRANSPARENT COATINGS FOR SOLAR CELLS RESEARCH

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Glatkowski, P. J.; Landis, D. A.

2013-04-16

Todays solar cells are fabricated using metal oxide based transparent conductive coatings (TCC) or metal wires with optoelectronic performance exceeding that currently possible with Carbon Nanotube (CNT) based TCCs. The motivation for replacing current TCC is their inherent brittleness, high deposition cost, and high deposition temperatures; leading to reduced performance on thin substrates. With improved processing, application and characterization techniques Nanofiber and/or CNT based TCCs can overcome these shortcomings while offering the ability to be applied in atmospheric conditions using low cost coating processes At todays level of development, CNT based TCC are nearing commercial use in touch screens, some types of information displays (i.e. electronic paper), and certain military applications. However, the resistivity and transparency requirements for use in current commercial solar cells are more stringent than in many of these applications. Therefore, significant research on fundamental nanotube composition, dispersion and deposition are required to reach the required performance commanded by photovoltaic devices. The objective of this project was to research and develop transparent conductive coatings based on novel nanomaterial composite coatings, which comprise nanotubes, nanofibers, and other nanostructured materials along with binder materials. One objective was to show that these new nanomaterials perform at an electrical resistivity and optical transparency suitable for use in solar cells and other energy-related applications. A second objective was to generate new structures and chemistries with improved resistivity and transparency performance. The materials also included the binders and surface treatments that facilitate the utility of the electrically conductive portion of these composites in solar photovoltaic devices. Performance enhancement venues included: CNT purification and metallic tube separation techniques, chemical doping, CNT

Analysis of each branch current of serial solar cells by using an equivalent circuit model

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yi Shi-Guang; Zhang Wan-Hui; Ai Bin; Song Jing-Wei; Shen Hui

2014-01-01

In this paper, based on the equivalent single diode circuit model of the solar cell, an equivalent circuit diagram for two serial solar cells is drawn. Its equations of current and voltage are derived from Kirchhoff's current and voltage law. First, parameters are obtained from the I—V (current—voltage) curves for typical monocrystalline silicon solar cells (125 mm × 125 mm). Then, by regarding photo-generated current, shunt resistance, serial resistance of the first solar cell, and resistance load as the variables. The properties of shunt currents (I sh1 and I sh2 ), diode currents (I D1 and I D2 ), and load current (I L ) for the whole two serial solar cells are numerically analyzed in these four cases for the first time, and the corresponding physical explanations are made. We find that these parameters have different influences on the internal currents of solar cells. Our results will provide a reference for developing higher efficiency solar cell module and contribute to the better understanding of the reason of efficiency loss of solar cell module. (interdisciplinary physics and related areas of science and technology)

Materials and Light Management for High-Efficiency Thin-Film Silicon Solar Cells

OpenAIRE

Tan, H.

2015-01-01

Direct conversion of sunlight into electricity is one of the most promising approaches to provide sufficient renewable energy for humankind. Solar cells are such devices which can efficiently generate electricity from sunlight through the photovoltaic effect. Thin-film silicon solar cells, a type of photovoltaic (PV) devices which deploy the chemical-vapor-deposited hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) and nanocrystalline silicon (nc-Si:H) and their alloys as the absorber layers and doped ...

Modeling and performance analysis dataset of a CIGS solar cell with ZnS buffer layer

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Md. Billal Hosen

2017-10-01

Full Text Available This article represents the baseline data of the several semiconductor materials used in the model of a CIGS thin film solar cell with an inclusion of ZnS buffer layer. As well, input parameters, contact layer data and operating conditions for CIGS solar cell simulation with ZnS buffer layer have been described. The schematic diagram of photovoltaic solar cell has been depicted. Moreover, the most important performance measurement graph, J-V characteristic curve, resulting from CIGS solar cell simulation has been analyzed to estimate the optimum values of fill factor and cell efficiency. These optimum results have been obtained from the open circuit voltage, short circuit current density, and the maximum points of voltage and current density generated from the cell.

Photon management in solar cells

CERN Document Server

Rau, Uwe; Gombert, Andreas

2015-01-01

Written by renowned experts in the field of photon management in solar cells, this one-stop reference gives an introduction to the physics of light management in solar cells, and discusses the different concepts and methods of applying photon management. The authors cover the physics, principles, concepts, technologies, and methods used, explaining how to increase the efficiency of solar cells by splitting or modifying the solar spectrum before they absorb the sunlight. In so doing, they present novel concepts and materials allowing for the cheaper, more flexible manufacture of solar cells and systems. For educational purposes, the authors have split the reasons for photon management into spatial and spectral light management. Bridging the gap between the photonics and the photovoltaics communities, this is an invaluable reference for materials scientists, physicists in industry, experimental physicists, lecturers in physics, Ph.D. students in physics and material sciences, engineers in power technology, appl...

Integration of Solar Cells on Top of CMOS Chips - Part II: CIGS Solar Cells

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Lu, J.; Liu, Wei; Kovalgin, Alexeij Y.; Sun, Yun; Schmitz, Jurriaan

2011-01-01

We present the monolithic integration of deepsubmicrometer complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) microchips with copper indium gallium (di)selenide (CIGS) solar cells. Solar cells are manufactured directly on unpackaged CMOS chips. The microchips maintain comparable electronic performance,

On-Orbit Demonstration of a Lithium-Ion Capacitor and Thin-Film Multijunction Solar Cells

Science.gov (United States)

Kukita, Akio; Takahashi, Masato; Shimazaki, Kazunori; Kobayashi, Yuki; Sakai, Tomohiko; Toyota, Hiroyuki; Takahashi, Yu; Murashima, Mio; Uno, Masatoshi; Imaizumi, Mitsuru

2014-08-01

This paper describes an on-orbit demonstration of the Next-generation Small Satellite Instrument for Electric power systems (NESSIE) on which an aluminum- laminated lithium-ion capacitor (LIC) and a lightweight solar panel called KKM-PNL, which has space solar sheets using thin-film multijunction solar cells, were installed. The flight data examined in this paper covers a period of 143 days from launch. We verified the integrity of an LIC constructed using a simple and lightweight mounting method: no significant capacitance reduction was observed. We also confirmed that inverted metamorphic multijunction triple-junction thin-film solar cells used for evaluation were healthy at 143 days after launch, because their degradation almost matched the degradation predictions for dual-junction thin-film solar cells.

Predicted solar cell edge radiation effects

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gates, M.T.

1993-01-01

The Advanced Solar Cell Orbital Test (ASCOT) will test six types of solar cells in a high energy proton environment. During the design of the experiment a question was raised about the effects of proton radiation incident on the edge of the solar cells and whether edge radiation shielding was required. Historical geosynchronous data indicated that edge radiation damage is not detectable over the normal end of life solar cell degradation; however because the ASCOT radiation environment has a much higher and more energetic fluence of protons, considerably more edge damage is expected. A computer analysis of the problem was made by modeling the expected radiation damage at the cell edge and using a network model of small interconnected solar cells to predict degradation in the cell's electrical output. The model indicated that the deepest penetration of edge radiation was at the top of the cell near the junction where the protons have access to the cell through the low density cell/cover adhesive layer. The network model indicated that the cells could tolerate high fluences at their edge as long as there was high electrical resistance between the edge radiated region and the contact system on top of the cell. The predicted edge radiation related loss was less than 2% of maximum power for GaAs/Ge solar cells. As a result, no edge radiation protection was used for ASCOT

Computer analysis of microcrystalline silicon hetero-junction solar cell with lumerical FDTD/DEVICE

Science.gov (United States)

Riaz, Muhammad; Earles, S. K.; Kadhim, Ahmed; Azzahrani, Ahmad

The computer analysis of tandem solar cell, c-Si/a-Si:H/μc-SiGe, is studied within Lumerical FDTD/Device 4.6. The optical characterization is performed in FDTD and then total generation rate is transported into DEVICE for electrical characterization. The electrical characterization of the solar cell is carried out in DEVICE. The design is implemented by staking three sub cells with band gap of 1.12eV, 1.50eV and 1.70eV, respectively. First, single junction solar cell with both a-Si and μc-SiGe absorbing layers are designed and compared. The thickness for both layers are kept the same. In a single junction, solar cell with a-Si absorbing layer, the fill factor and the efficiency are noticed as FF = 78.98%, and η = 6.03%. For μc-SiGe absorbing layer, the efficiency and fill factor are increased as η = 7.06% and FF = 84.27%, respectively. Second, for tandem thin film solar cell c-Si/a-Si:H/μc-SiGe, the fill factor FF = 81.91% and efficiency η = 9.84% have been noticed. The maximum efficiency for both single junction thin film solar cell c-Si/μc-SiGe and tandem solar cell c-Si/a-Si:H/μc-SiGe are improved with check board surface design for light trapping.

Material challenges for solar cells in the twenty-first century: directions in emerging technologies

Science.gov (United States)

Delamarre, Amaury; Jehl, Zacharie; Suchet, Daniel; Cojocaru, Ludmila; Giteau, Maxime; Behaghel, Benoit; Julian, Anatole; Ibrahim, Camille; Tatry, Léa; Wang, Haibin; Kubo, Takaya; Uchida, Satoshi; Segawa, Hiroshi; Miyashita, Naoya; Tamaki, Ryo; Shoji, Yasushi; Yoshida, Katsuhisa; Ahsan, Nazmul; Watanabe, Kentaro; Inoue, Tomoyuki; Sugiyama, Masakazu; Nakano, Yoshiaki; Hamamura, Tomofumi; Toupance, Thierry; Olivier, Céline; Chambon, Sylvain; Vignau, Laurence; Geffroy, Camille; Cloutet, Eric; Hadziioannou, Georges; Cavassilas, Nicolas; Rale, Pierre; Cattoni, Andrea; Collin, Stéphane; Gibelli, François; Paire, Myriam; Lombez, Laurent; Aureau, Damien; Bouttemy, Muriel; Etcheberry, Arnaud; Okada, Yoshitaka

2018-01-01

Abstract Photovoltaic generation has stepped up within the last decade from outsider status to one of the important contributors of the ongoing energy transition, with about 1.7% of world electricity provided by solar cells. Progress in materials and production processes has played an important part in this development. Yet, there are many challenges before photovoltaics could provide clean, abundant, and cheap energy. Here, we review this research direction, with a focus on the results obtained within a Japan–French cooperation program, NextPV, working on promising solar cell technologies. The cooperation was focused on efficient photovoltaic devices, such as multijunction, ultrathin, intermediate band, and hot-carrier solar cells, and on printable solar cell materials such as colloidal quantum dots. PMID:29707072

Can quantum coherent solar cells break detailed balance?

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kirk, Alexander P.

2015-01-01

Carefully engineered coherent quantum states have been proposed as a design attribute that is hypothesized to enable solar photovoltaic cells to break the detailed balance (or radiative) limit of power conversion efficiency by possibly causing radiative recombination to be suppressed. However, in full compliance with the principles of statistical mechanics and the laws of thermodynamics, specially prepared coherent quantum states do not allow a solar photovoltaic cell—a quantum threshold energy conversion device—to exceed the detailed balance limit of power conversion efficiency. At the condition given by steady-state open circuit operation with zero nonradiative recombination, the photon absorption rate (or carrier photogeneration rate) must balance the photon emission rate (or carrier radiative recombination rate) thus ensuring that detailed balance prevails. Quantum state transitions, entropy-generating hot carrier relaxation, and photon absorption and emission rate balancing are employed holistically and self-consistently along with calculations of current density, voltage, and power conversion efficiency to explain why detailed balance may not be violated in solar photovoltaic cells

Influence of spectral solar radiation to the generating power of photovoltaic module; Taiyo denchi shutsuryoku eno taiyoko supekutoru eno eikyo

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Minaki, S.; Ishihara, Y.; Todaka, T.; Harada, K. [Doshisha University, Kyoto (Japan); Oshiro, T.; Nakamura, H. [Japan quality Assurance Organization, Tokyo (Japan)

1997-11-25

As to the influence of spectral solar radiation to generating power of solar cells, a study was conducted from the aspects of season, time zone, intensity of solar radiation, etc. In the study, spectral responsive variation correction coefficients were introduced as evaluation values expressing the influence of spectral solar radiation. For the spectral distribution, an all sky spectral pyranometer by wavelength was used, and data were used which were obtained in the measurement in experimental facilities of the solar techno center. Concerning solar cell relative spectral sensitivity values, used were relative spectral sensitivity values of monocrystal and amorphous standard solar cells to the short-circuit current. Spectral response variation correction coefficients are coefficients correcting variations in conversion efficiency of solar cells due to changes in the spectral distribution. The changes of spectral responsive variation correction coefficients were studied using data obtained during April 1994 and March 1996. As a result, it was found that the coefficients showed large changes in summer and small ones in winter and that amorphous solar cells indicate this trend conspicuously. 3 refs., 6 figs., 3 tabs.

Anode catalysts for direct ethanol fuel cells utilizing directly solar light illumination.

Science.gov (United States)

Chu, Daobao; Wang, Shuxi; Zheng, Peng; Wang, Jian; Zha, Longwu; Hou, Yuanyuan; He, Jianguo; Xiao, Ying; Lin, Huashui; Tian, Zhaowu

2009-01-01

Shine a light: A PtNiRu/TiO(2) anode catalyst for direct ethanol fuel cells shows photocatalytic activity. The peak current density for ethanol oxidation under solar light illumination is 2-3 times greater than that in the absence of solar light. Ethanol is oxidized by light-generated holes, and the electrons are collected by the TiO(2) support to generate the oxidation current.Novel PtNiRu/TiO(2) anode catalysts for direct ethanol fuel cells (DEFCs) were prepared from PtNiRu nanoparticles (1:1:1 atomic ratios) and a nanoporous TiO(2) film by a sol-gel and electrodeposition method. The performances of the catalysts for ethanol oxidation were investigated by cyclic voltammetry, chronoamperometry and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. The results indicate a remarkable enhancement of activity for ethanol oxidation under solar light illumination. Under solar light illumination, the generated oxidation peak current density is 24.6 mA cm(-2), which is about 2.5 times higher than that observed without solar light (9.9 mA cm(-2)). The high catalytic activity of the PtNiRu/TiO(2) complex catalyst for the electrooxidation of ethanol may be attributed to the modified metal/nanoporous TiO(2) film, and the enhanced electrooxidation of ethanol under solar light may be due to the photogeneration of holes in the modified nanoporous TiO(2) film.

Commercial Development Of Ovonic Thin Film Solar Cells

Science.gov (United States)

Ovshinsky, Stanford R.

1983-09-01

One square foot Ovonic amorphous photovoltaic devices are already in commercial production and are manufactured through a continuous web process. The next levels of commercialization required to achieve a large-volume power market will be discussed, and the device specifications correlated with the chemical and electronic properties of the materials that we are developing to achieve even higher efficiencies. It has been long considered a utopian dream to harness the energy of the sun to create electricity that would be competitive in cost to that produced from the conventional sources of energy such as oil, gas, and uranium. The impact on our society of stand-alone power generators without moving parts using the continually available, ubiquitous energy of the sun could certainly lead to a new age with consequences comparable to the first introduction of electricity which greatly accelerated the Industrial Revolution. Low cost, nonpolluting energy not dependent upon or limited by transmission costs could again make DC electricity a realistic option. The relatively young field of photovoltaics suffers from certain dogmas that are just now being questioned. For example, it is thought by many that solar cells utilizing crys-talline materials have inherently higher efficiencies than those using amorphous materials, and that somehow crystalline solar cells, whether fabricated from single crystals or polycrystalline material, in round or rectangular geometries, grown from the melt or by a rib-bon process, can be reduced in cost sufficiently that the economics become attractive enough for large-scale terrestrial generation of power. In this paper, we shall show that amorphous materials can have much higher efficiencies than do crystalline and that the answer to our power generation needs lies not in crystalline but in amorphous technology. At Energy Conversion Devices, Inc. (ECD), we have designed and built a production machine (described by my colleague, Dr. Izu, in a

Improving the photovoltaic performance of perovskite solar cells with acetate

Science.gov (United States)

Zhao, Qian; Li, G. R.; Song, Jian; Zhao, Yulong; Qiang, Yinghuai; Gao, X. P.

2016-01-01

In an all-solid-state perovskite solar cell, methylammonium lead halide film is in charge of generating photo-excited electrons, thus its quality can directly influence the final photovoltaic performance of the solar cell. This paper accentuates a very simple chemical approach to improving the quality of a perovskite film with a suitable amount of acetic acid. With introduction of acetate ions, a homogeneous, continual and hole-free perovskite film comprised of high-crystallinity grains is obtained. UV-visible spectra, steady-state and time-resolved photoluminescence (PL) spectra reveal that the obtained perovskite film under the optimized conditions shows a higher light absorption, more efficient electron transport, and faster electron extraction to the adjoining electron transport layer. The features result in the optimized perovskite film can provide an improved short-circuit current. The corresponding solar cells with a planar configuration achieves an improved power conversion efficiency of 13.80%, and the highest power conversion efficiency in the photovoltaic measurements is up to 14.71%. The results not only provide a simple approach to optimizing perovskite films but also present a novel angle of view on fabricating high-performance perovskite solar cells. PMID:27934924

Improving the photovoltaic performance of perovskite solar cells with acetate.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhao, Qian; Li, G R; Song, Jian; Zhao, Yulong; Qiang, Yinghuai; Gao, X P

2016-12-09

In an all-solid-state perovskite solar cell, methylammonium lead halide film is in charge of generating photo-excited electrons, thus its quality can directly influence the final photovoltaic performance of the solar cell. This paper accentuates a very simple chemical approach to improving the quality of a perovskite film with a suitable amount of acetic acid. With introduction of acetate ions, a homogeneous, continual and hole-free perovskite film comprised of high-crystallinity grains is obtained. UV-visible spectra, steady-state and time-resolved photoluminescence (PL) spectra reveal that the obtained perovskite film under the optimized conditions shows a higher light absorption, more efficient electron transport, and faster electron extraction to the adjoining electron transport layer. The features result in the optimized perovskite film can provide an improved short-circuit current. The corresponding solar cells with a planar configuration achieves an improved power conversion efficiency of 13.80%, and the highest power conversion efficiency in the photovoltaic measurements is up to 14.71%. The results not only provide a simple approach to optimizing perovskite films but also present a novel angle of view on fabricating high-performance perovskite solar cells.

Hybrid emitter all back contact solar cell

Science.gov (United States)

Loscutoff, Paul; Rim, Seung

2016-04-12

An all back contact solar cell has a hybrid emitter design. The solar cell has a thin dielectric layer formed on a backside surface of a single crystalline silicon substrate. One emitter of the solar cell is made of doped polycrystalline silicon that is formed on the thin dielectric layer. The other emitter of the solar cell is formed in the single crystalline silicon substrate and is made of doped single crystalline silicon. The solar cell includes contact holes that allow metal contacts to connect to corresponding emitters.

Solar Airplanes and Regenerative Fuel Cells

Science.gov (United States)

Bents, David J.

2007-01-01

A solar electric aircraft with the potential to "fly forever" has captured NASA's interest, and the concept for such an aircraft was pursued under Aeronautics Environmental Research Aircraft and Sensor Technology (ERAST) project. Feasibility of this aircraft happens to depend on the successful development of solar power technologies critical to NASA's Exploration Initiatives; hence, there was widespread interest throughout NASA to bring these technologies to a flight demonstration. The most critical is an energy storage system to sustain mission power during night periods. For the solar airplane, whose flight capability is already limited by the diffuse nature of solar flux and subject to latitude and time of year constraints, the feasibility of long endurance flight depends on a storage density figure of merit better than 400-600 watt-hr per kilogram. This figure of merit is beyond the capability of present day storage technologies (other than nuclear) but may be achievable in the hydrogen-oxygen regenerative fuel cell (RFC). This potential has led NASA to undertake the practical development of a hydrogen-oxygen regenerative fuel cell, initially as solar energy storage for a high altitude UAV science platform but eventually to serve as the primary power source for NASAs lunar base and other planet surface installations. Potentially the highest storage capacity and lowest weight of any non-nuclear device, a flight-weight RFC aboard a solar-electric aircraft that is flown continuously through several successive day-night cycles will provide the most convincing demonstration that this technology's widespread potential has been realized. In 1998 NASA began development of a closed cycle hydrogen oxygen PEM RFC under the Aeronautics Environmental Research Aircraft and Sensor Technology (ERAST) project and continued its development, originally for a solar electric airplane flight, through FY2005 under the Low Emissions Alternative Power (LEAP) project. Construction of

Evaluation methods of solar contribution in solar aided coal-fired power generation system

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Zhu, Yong; Zhai, Rongrong; Zhao, Miaomiao; Yang, Yongping; Yan, Qin

2015-01-01

Highlights: • Five methods for evaluating solar contribution are analyzed. • Method based on the second law of thermodynamics and thermal economics is more suitable for SACPGS. • Providing reliable reference for the formulation of feed-in tariff policies in China. - Abstract: Solar aided coal-fired power plants utilize solar thermal energy to couple with coal-fired power plants of various types by adopting characteristics of different thermal needs of plants. In this way, the costly thermal storage system and power generating system will become unnecessary, meanwhile the intermittent and unsteady nature of power generation can be avoided. In addition, large-scale utilization of solar thermal power and energy saving can be achieved. With the ever-deepening analyses of solar aided coal-fired power plants, the contribution evaluating system of solar thermal power is worth further exploration. In this paper, five common evaluation methods of solar contribution are analyzed, and solar aided coal-fired power plants of 1000 MW, 600 MW and 330 MW are studied with these five methods in a comparative manner. Therefore, this study can serve as a theoretical reference for future research of evaluation methods and subsidies for new energy

Industrial Silicon Wafer Solar Cells

OpenAIRE

Neuhaus, Dirk-Holger; Münzer, Adolf

2007-01-01

In 2006, around 86% of all wafer-based silicon solar cells were produced using screen printing to form the silver front and aluminium rear contacts and chemical vapour deposition to grow silicon nitride as the antireflection coating onto the front surface. This paper reviews this dominant solar cell technology looking into state-of-the-art equipment and corresponding processes for each process step. The main efficiency losses of this type of solar cell are analyzed to demonstrate the future e...

Flexible silicon solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Blakers, A.W.; Armour, T. [Centre for Sustainable Energy Systems, The Australian National University, Canberra ACT 0200 (Australia)

2009-08-15

In order to be useful for certain niche applications, crystalline silicon solar cells must be able to sustain either one-time flexure or multiple non-critical flexures without significant loss of strength or efficiency. This paper describes experimental characterisation of the behaviour of thin crystalline silicon solar cells, under either static or repeated flexure, by flexing samples and recording any resulting changes in performance. Thin SLIVER cells were used for the experiment. Mechanical strength was found to be unaffected after 100,000 flexures. Solar conversion efficiency remained at greater than 95% of the initial value after 100,000 flexures. Prolonged one-time flexure close to, but not below, the fracture radius resulted in no significant change of properties. For every sample, fracture occurred either on the first flexure to a given radius of curvature, or not at all when using that radius. In summary, for a given radius of curvature, either the flexed solar cells broke immediately, or they were essentially unaffected by prolonged or multiple flexing. (author)

Solar cells based on InP/GaP/Si structure

Science.gov (United States)

Kvitsiani, O.; Laperashvil, D.; Laperashvili, T.; Mikelashvili, V.

2016-10-01

Solar cells (SCs) based on III-V semiconductors are reviewed. Presented work emphases on the Solar Cells containing Quantum Dots (QDs) for next-generation photovoltaics. In this work the method of fabrication of InP QDs on III-V semiconductors is investigated. The original method of electrochemical deposition of metals: indium (In), gallium (Ga) and of alloys (InGa) on the surface of gallium phosphide (GaP), and mechanism of formation of InP QDs on GaP surface is presented. The possibilities of application of InP/GaP/Si structure as SC are discussed, and the challenges arising is also considered.

Solar cells: An environment-benign energy source?

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Alsema, E.; Van Engelenburg, B.

1993-01-01

Attention is paid to a study on the environmental aspects of solar cell production techniques and the possibility of recycling solar cell materials. In the study the following types of solar cell modules are dealt with: CdTe and CuInSe 2 , amorphous silicon, crystalline silicon, and GaAs. It appears that silicon solar cells have minor environmental effects and are controllable. However, attention should be paid to the energy consumption and the use of etching and purification materials during the production of solar cells, and the emission of heavy metals from f.e. CdTe/CIS solar cells during and after usage. Without effective recycling enough supplies of indium, selenium and tellurium cannot be guaranteed. 3 figs., 1 ill

Solar thermal electric power generation - an attractive option for Pakistan

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Khan, N.A

1999-01-01

Solar Thermal Energy is being successfully used for production of electricity in few developed countries for more than 10 years. In solar Electric Generating Systems high temperature is generated by concentrating solar energy on black absorber pipe in evacuated glass tubes. This heat is absorbed and transported with the help of high temperature oil in to highly insulated heat exchanger storage tanks. They are subsequently used to produce steam that generates power through steam turbines as in standard thermal power plants. Various components involved in Solar thermal field have been developed at the Solar Systems Laboratory of College of EME, NUST Rawalpindi. It is considered as a cost effective alternate for power generation. The research has been partially sponsored by Ministry of Science and Technology under its Public Sector Development Program (PSDP) in (1996-1998). Parabolic mirror design, fabrication, polishing, installation, solar tracking, absorber pipe, glass tubes, steam generation al have been developed. This paper will cover the details of indigenous technological break through made in this direction. (author)

Modeling and optimization of a novel solar chimney cogeneration power plant combined with solid oxide electrolysis/fuel cell

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Joneydi Shariatzadeh, O.; Refahi, A.H.; Abolhassani, S.S.; Rahmani, M.

2015-01-01

Highlights: • Proposed a solar chimney cogeneration power plant combined with solid oxide fuel cell. • Conducted single-objective economic optimization of cycle by genetic algorithm. • Stored surplus hydrogen in season solarium to supply electricity in winter by SOFC. - Abstract: Using solar chimney in desert areas like El Paso city in Texas, USA, with high intensity solar radiation is efficient and environmental friendly. However, one of the main challenges in terms of using solar chimneys is poor electricity generation at night. In this paper, a new power plant plan is proposed which simultaneously generates heat and electricity using a solar chimney with solid oxide fuel cells and solid oxide electrolysis cells. In one hand, the solar chimney generates electricity by sunlight and supplies a part of demand. Then, additional electricity is generated through the high temperature electrolysis which produces hydrogen that is stored in tanks and converted into electricity by solid oxide fuel cells. After designing and modeling the cycle components, the economic aspect of this power plant is considered numerically by means of genetic algorithm. The results indicate that, 0.28 kg/s hydrogen is produced at the peak of the radiation. With such a hydrogen production rate, this system supplies 79.26% and 37.04% of the demand in summer and winter respectively in a district of El Paso city.

New Components for Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Stefano Caramori

2010-01-01

Full Text Available Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells (DSSCs are among the most promising solar energy conversion devices of new generation, since coupling ease of fabrication and low cost offer the possibility of building integration in photovoltaic windows and facades. Although in their earliest configuration these systems are close to commercialization, fundamental studies are still required for developing new molecules and materials with more desirable properties as well as improving our understanding of the fundamental processes at the basis of the functioning of photoactive heterogeneous interfaces. In this contribution, some recent advances, made in the effort of improving DSSC devices by finding alternative materials and configurations, are reviewed.

AlGaAs top solar cell for mechanical attachment in a multi-junction tandem concentrator solar cell stack

Science.gov (United States)

Dinetta, L. C.; Hannon, M. H.; Cummings, J. R.; Mcneeley, J. B.; Barnett, Allen M.

1990-01-01

Free-standing, transparent, tunable bandgap AlxGa1-xAs top solar cells have been fabricated for mechanical attachment in a four terminal tandem stack solar cell. Evaluation of the device results has demonstrated 1.80 eV top solar cells with efficiencies of 18 percent (100 X, and AM0) which would yield stack efficiencies of 31 percent (100 X, AM0) with a silicon bottom cell. When fully developed, the AlxGa1-xAs/Si mechanically-stacked two-junction solar cell concentrator system can provide efficiencies of 36 percent (AM0, 100 X). AlxGa1-xAs top solar cells with bandgaps from 1.66 eV to 2.08 eV have been fabricated. Liquid phase epitaxy (LPE) growth techniques have been used and LPE has been found to yield superior AlxGa1-xAs material when compared to molecular beam epitaxy and metal-organic chemical vapor deposition. It is projected that stack assembly technology will be readily applicable to any mechanically stacked multijunction (MSMJ) system. Development of a wide bandgap top solar cell is the only feasible method for obtaining stack efficiencies greater than 40 percent at AM0. System efficiencies of greater than 40 percent can be realized when the AlGaAs top solar cell is used in a three solar cell mechanical stack.

Enhancing solar cell efficiency: the search for luminescent materials as spectral converters.

Science.gov (United States)

Huang, Xiaoyong; Han, Sanyang; Huang, Wei; Liu, Xiaogang

2013-01-07

Photovoltaic (PV) technologies for solar energy conversion represent promising routes to green and renewable energy generation. Despite relevant PV technologies being available for more than half a century, the production of solar energy remains costly, largely owing to low power conversion efficiencies of solar cells. The main difficulty in improving the efficiency of PV energy conversion lies in the spectral mismatch between the energy distribution of photons in the incident solar spectrum and the bandgap of a semiconductor material. In recent years, luminescent materials, which are capable of converting a broad spectrum of light into photons of a particular wavelength, have been synthesized and used to minimize the losses in the solar-cell-based energy conversion process. In this review, we will survey recent progress in the development of spectral converters, with a particular emphasis on lanthanide-based upconversion, quantum-cutting and down-shifting materials, for PV applications. In addition, we will also present technical challenges that arise in developing cost-effective high-performance solar cells based on these luminescent materials.

Thin-film solar cell

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Metselaar, J.W.; Kuznetsov, V.I.

1998-01-01

The invention relates to a thin-film solar cell provided with at least one p-i-n junction comprising at least one p-i junction which is at an angle alpha with that surface of the thin-film solar cell which collects light during operation and at least one i-n junction which is at an angle beta with

The characteristic analysis of the solar energy photovoltaic power generation system

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, B.; Li, K.; Niu, D. D.; Jin, Y. A.; Liu, Y.

2017-01-01

Solar energy is an inexhaustible, clean, renewable energy source. Photovoltaic cells are a key component in solar power generation, so thorough research on output characteristics is of far-reaching importance. In this paper, an illumination model and a photovoltaic power station output power model were established, and simulation analysis was conducted using Matlab and other software. The analysis evaluated the condition of solar energy resources in the Baicheng region in the western part of Jilin province, China. The characteristic curve of the power output from a photovoltaic power station was obtained by simulation calculation. It was shown that the monthly average output power of the photovoltaic power station is affected by seasonal changes; the output power is higher in summer and autumn, and lower in spring and winter.

Iron sulphide solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Ennaoui, A.; Tributsch, H.

1984-12-01

The abundant, naturally occurring natural compound pyrite (FeS2) can be used as a semiconducting material for photoelectrochemical and photovoltaic solar cells. Unlike most of the intensively studied photoactive materials, pyrite solar cell production would never be limited by the availability of the elements or by their compatibility with the environment. An energy gap of 0.95 eV has been determined for pyrite, and it is noted that the theoretical efficiency limit for solar energy conversion in this material is of the order of 15-20 percent.

Radiation resistance of amorphous silicon alloy solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hanak, J.J.; Chen, E.; Myatt, A.; Woodyard, J.R.

1987-01-01

The radiation resistance of a-Si alloy solar cells when bombarded by high energy particles is reviewed. The results of investigations of high energy proton radiation resistance of a-Si alloy thin film photovoltaic cells are reported. Irradiations were carried out with 200 keV and 1.00 MeV protons with fluences ranging betweeen 1E11 and 1E15 cm-2. Defect generation and passivation mechanisms were studied using the AM1 conversion efficiency and isochronal anneals. It is concluded that the primary defect generation mechanism results from the knock-on of Si and Ge in the intrinsic layer of the cells. The defect passivation proceeds by the complex annealing of Si and Ge defects and not by the simple migration of hydrogen

Simple processing of back-contacted silicon heterojunction solar cells using selective-area crystalline growth

KAUST Repository

Tomasi, Andrea; Paviet-Salomon, Bertrand; Jeangros, Quentin; Haschke, Jan; Christmann, Gabriel; Barraud, Loris; Descoeudres, Antoine; Seif, Johannes Peter; Nicolay, Sylvain; Despeisse, Matthieu; De Wolf, Stefaan; Ballif, Christophe

2017-01-01

For crystalline-silicon solar cells, voltages close to the theoretical limit are nowadays readily achievable when using passivating contacts. Conversely, maximal current generation requires the integration of the electron and hole contacts at the back of the solar cell to liberate its front from any shadowing loss. Recently, the world-record efficiency for crystalline-silicon single-junction solar cells was achieved by merging these two approaches in a single device; however, the complexity of fabricating this class of devices raises concerns about their commercial potential. Here we show a contacting method that substantially simplifies the architecture and fabrication of back-contacted silicon solar cells. We exploit the surface-dependent growth of silicon thin films, deposited by plasma processes, to eliminate the patterning of one of the doped carrier-collecting layers. Then, using only one alignment step for electrode definition, we fabricate a proof-of-concept 9-cm2 tunnel-interdigitated back-contact solar cell with a certified conversion efficiency >22.5%.

Simple processing of back-contacted silicon heterojunction solar cells using selective-area crystalline growth

KAUST Repository

Tomasi, Andrea

2017-04-24

For crystalline-silicon solar cells, voltages close to the theoretical limit are nowadays readily achievable when using passivating contacts. Conversely, maximal current generation requires the integration of the electron and hole contacts at the back of the solar cell to liberate its front from any shadowing loss. Recently, the world-record efficiency for crystalline-silicon single-junction solar cells was achieved by merging these two approaches in a single device; however, the complexity of fabricating this class of devices raises concerns about their commercial potential. Here we show a contacting method that substantially simplifies the architecture and fabrication of back-contacted silicon solar cells. We exploit the surface-dependent growth of silicon thin films, deposited by plasma processes, to eliminate the patterning of one of the doped carrier-collecting layers. Then, using only one alignment step for electrode definition, we fabricate a proof-of-concept 9-cm2 tunnel-interdigitated back-contact solar cell with a certified conversion efficiency >22.5%.

Enhancing light absorption within the carrier transport length in quantum junction solar cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Fu, Yulan; Hara, Yukihiro; Miller, Christopher W; Lopez, Rene

2015-09-10

Colloidal quantum dot (CQD) solar cells have attracted tremendous attention because of their tunable absorption spectrum window and potentially low processing cost. Recently reported quantum junction solar cells represent a promising approach to building a rectifying photovoltaic device that employs CQD layers on each side of the p-n junction. However, the ultimate efficiency of CQD solar cells is still highly limited by their high trap state density in both p- and n-type CQDs. By modeling photonic structures to enhance the light absorption within the carrier transport length and by ensuring that the carrier generation and collection efficiencies were both augmented, our work shows that overall device current density could be improved. We utilized a two-dimensional numerical model to calculate the characteristics of patterned CQD solar cells based on a simple grating structure. Our calculation predicts a short circuit current density as high as 31  mA/cm2, a value nearly 1.5 times larger than that of the conventional flat design, showing the great potential value of patterned quantum junction solar cells.

Machine for welding solar cell connections

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Lorans, D.Y.

1977-08-09

A machine for welding a connection wire over a solar cell electrode is described which comprises a base, a welding mount for the solar cell which is supported on the base, means for holding the solar cell on the welding mount, welding electrodes, means to lower the welding electrodes over the solar cell and the connection wire superimposed thereon, means for applying electric current pulses to said welding electrodes. It is characterized by the fact that it further comprises means for imparting to said mount an alternating transverse movement in relation to said base before and during the welding operation.

Fundamental limit of nanophotonic light trapping in solar cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Yu, Zongfu; Raman, Aaswath; Fan, Shanhui

2010-10-12

Establishing the fundamental limit of nanophotonic light-trapping schemes is of paramount importance and is becoming increasingly urgent for current solar cell research. The standard theory of light trapping demonstrated that absorption enhancement in a medium cannot exceed a factor of 4n(2)/sin(2)θ, where n is the refractive index of the active layer, and θ is the angle of the emission cone in the medium surrounding the cell. This theory, however, is not applicable in the nanophotonic regime. Here we develop a statistical temporal coupled-mode theory of light trapping based on a rigorous electromagnetic approach. Our theory reveals that the conventional limit can be substantially surpassed when optical modes exhibit deep-subwavelength-scale field confinement, opening new avenues for highly efficient next-generation solar cells.

Natural Dye-Sensitized Solar Cell Based on Nanocrystalline TiO2

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Jasim, K.E.

2012-01-01

During the last quarter of the twentieth century there have been intensive research activities looking for green sources of energy. The main aim of the green generators or converters of energy is to replace the conventional (fossil) energy sources, hence reducing further accumulation of the green house gasses GHGs. Conventional silicon and III-V semiconductor solar cell based on crystalline bulk, quantum well and quantum dots structure or amorphous and thin film structures provided a feasible solution. However, natural dye sensitized solar cells NDSSC are a promising class of photovoltaic cells with the capability of generating green energy at low production cost since no vacuum systems or expensive equipment are required in their fabrication. Also, natural dyes are abundant, easily extracted and safe materials. In NDSSC, once dye molecules exposed to light they become oxidized and transfer electrons to a nano structured layer of wide bandgap semiconductors such as TiO 2 . The generated electrons are drawn outside the cell through ohmic contact to a load. In this paper we review the structure and operation principles of the dye sensitized solar cell DSSC. We discuss preparation procedures, optical and electrical characterization of the NDSSC using local dyes extracted from Henna (Lawsonia inermis L.), pomegranate, cherries and Bahraini raspberries (Rubus spp.). These natural organic dyes are potential candidates to replace some of the man-made dyes used as sensitizer in many commercialized photoelectrochemical cells. Factors limiting the operation of the DSSC are discussed. NDSSCs are expected to be a favored choice in the building-integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) due to their robustness, therefore, requiring no special shielding from natural events such as tree strikes or hails. (author)

Nanostructuring of Solar Cell Surfaces

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Davidsen, Rasmus Schmidt; Schmidt, Michael Stenbæk

Solar energy is by far the most abundant renewable energy source available, but the levelized cost of solar energy is still not competitive with that of fossil fuels. Therefore there is a need to improve the power conversion effciency of solar cells without adding to the production cost. The main...... objective of this PhD thesis is to develop nanostructured silicon (Si) solar cells with higher power conversion efficiency using only scalable and cost-efficient production methods. The nanostructures, known as 'black silicon', are fabricated by single-step, maskless reactive ion etching and used as front...... texturing of different Si solar cells. Theoretically the nanostructure topology may be described as a graded refractive index in a mean-field approximation between air and Si. The optical properties of the developed black Si were simulated and experimentally measured. Total AM1.5G-weighted average...

Air-processed organic tandem solar cells on glass: toward competitive operating lifetimes

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Adams, Jens; Spyropoulos, George D.; Salvador, Michael

2015-01-01

efficiencies of more than 10% the rather limited stability of this type of devices raises concerns towards future commercialization. The tandem concept allows for both absorbing a broader range of the solar spectrum and reducing thermalization losses. We designed an organic tandem solar cell with an inverted...... device geometry comprising environmentally stable active and charge-selecting layers. Under continuous white light irradiation, we demonstrate an extrapolated, operating lifetime in excess of one decade. We elucidate that for the current generation of organic tandem cells one critical requirement...... for long operating lifetimes consists of periodic UV light treatment. These results suggest that new material approaches towards UV-resilient active and interfacial layers may enable efficient organic tandem solar cells with lifetimes competitive with traditional inorganic photovoltaics....

Quantum dot optoelectronic devices: lasers, photodetectors and solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wu, Jiang; Chen, Siming; Seeds, Alwyn; Liu, Huiyun

2015-01-01

Nanometre-scale semiconductor devices have been envisioned as next-generation technologies with high integration and functionality. Quantum dots, or the so-called ‘artificial atoms’, exhibit unique properties due to their quantum confinement in all 3D. These unique properties have brought to light the great potential of quantum dots in optoelectronic applications. Numerous efforts worldwide have been devoted to these promising nanomaterials for next-generation optoelectronic devices, such as lasers, photodetectors, amplifiers, and solar cells, with the emphasis on improving performance and functionality. Through the development in optoelectronic devices based on quantum dots over the last two decades, quantum dot devices with exceptional performance surpassing previous devices are evidenced. This review describes recent developments in quantum dot optoelectronic devices over the last few years. The paper will highlight the major progress made in 1.3 μm quantum dot lasers, quantum dot infrared photodetectors, and quantum dot solar cells. (topical review)

Flexible Solar Cells

Science.gov (United States)

1994-01-01

Solar cell "modules" are plastic strips coated with thin films of photovoltaic silicon that collect solar energy for instant conversion into electricity. Lasers divide the thin film coating into smaller cells to build up voltage. Developed by Iowa Thin Film Technologies under NASA and DOE grants, the modules are used as electrical supply for advertising displays, battery rechargers for recreational vehicles, and to power model airplanes. The company is planning other applications both in consumer goods and as a power source in underdeveloped countries.

Extended Temperature Solar Cell Technology Development

Science.gov (United States)

Landis, Geoffrey A.; Jenkins, Phillip; Scheiman, David; Rafaelle, Ryne

2004-01-01

Future NASA missions will require solar cells to operate both in regimes closer to the sun, and farther from the sun, where the operating temperatures will be higher and lower than standard operational conditions. NASA Glenn is engaged in testing solar cells under extended temperature ranges, developing theoretical models of cell operation as a function of temperature, and in developing technology for improving the performance of solar cells for both high and low temperature operation.

Performance Maintenance of Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells Using a Latent Heat Storage Material

Science.gov (United States)

Haruki, Naoto; Horibe, Akihiko

2017-07-01

Recently, there has been considerable interest in various renewable energies. Among them, solar cell production has increased markedly because the photovoltaic is a clean and safe power generation method. The dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC) has attracted much attention as an alternative to silicon solar cells due to lower manufacturing costs and plentiful resources for DSSC production. However, the performance of DSSCs has been limited by their durability and low photoelectric conversion efficiency. Temperature control of DSSCs via phase-change materials (PCMs) is expected to improve performance. In this study, DSSCs were heated or cooled with a heat exchanger copper block that was in contact with a PCM (heptadecane), while being irradiated by a solar simulator light source. The durability and photoelectric conversion efficiency of the DSSC improved under PCM temperature control.

Ionization effects on Cu(In, Ga)Se{sub 2} thin-film solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kawakita, Shirou; Imaizumi, Mitsuru [Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, 2-1-1 Sengen, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-0031 (Japan); Ishizuka, Shogo; Shibata, Hajime [Institute of National Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, 1-1 Umezono, Tsukuba 305-8568 (Japan); Okuda, Shuichi [Osaka Prefecture University, 1-2 Gakuenmachi, Sakai 599-8570 (Japan)

2017-06-15

Cu (In, Ga) Se{sub 2} (CIGS) solar cells were irradiated with 60, 100, and 250 keV electrons to reveal the characteristics of radiation induced defects. Electrons with less than 200 keV energy cannot generate any displacement defects in CIGS materials. In addition, a low amount of the electrons can improve the roll-over behavior in current-voltage characteristics of CIGS solar cells. However, the deterioration of the electrical performance in CIGS solar cells irradiated with a high amount of electrons was observed. The deterioration rate on the cells irradiated with lower-energy electrons was higher than that induced by electrons with higher-energy. The degradation curve of J{sub SC} based on the ionizing dose estimated from the ionizing energy loss model does not depend on the energy of electrons. Therefore, it implies that the electrons can degrade CIGS solar cells due to the ionization effect. (copyright 2017 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH and Co. KGaA, Weinheim)

Crossed BiOI flake array solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Wang, Kewei; Jia, Falong; Zhang, Lizhi [Key Laboratory of Pesticide and Chemical Biology of Ministry of Education, College of Chemistry, Central China Normal University, Wuhan (China); Zheng, Zhi [Institute of Surface Micro and Nano Materials, Xuchang University (China)

2010-12-15

We report a new kind of solar cell based on crossed flake-like BiOI arrays for the first time. The BiOI flake arrays were fabricated on an FTO glass with a TiO{sub 2} block layer at room temperature by successive ionic layer adsorption and reaction (SILAR) method. The resulting BiOI flake array solar cell exhibited enhanced photovoltaic performance under solar illumination. This work provides an attractive and new solar cell system and a facile route to fabricate low cost and non-toxic solar cell. (author)

Optimal Design for the Diffusion Plate with Nanoparticles in a Diffusive Solar Cell Window by Mie Scattering Simulation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ruei-Tang Chen

2013-01-01

Full Text Available A diffusive solar cell window comprises a diffusion plate with TiO2 nanoparticles sandwiched between two glass layers. It is a simple, inexpensive, easy-to-made, and highly reliable transparent solar energy module. To improve its power generation efficiency as well as maintain indoor natural lighting, we examined the scattering mechanism in the diffusion plate with TiO2 nanoparticles within a diffusive solar cell window by Mie scattering simulations. In this work, a multiwavelength ASAP ray tracing model for a diffusive solar cell window with acceptable accuracy was developed to investigate the influence of the diffusion plate design parameter, mainly concentration of a diffusion plate with determined particle size distribution, on power generation efficiency and color shift of transmitted sun light. A concept of “effective average radius” was proposed to account for the equivalent scattering effect of a size distribution of quasispherical particles. Simulation results demonstrated that both the transmitted light and its correlated color temperature decreased as the concentration increased for a large-size diffusive solar cell window. However, there existed a maximum power generation efficiency at around 160 ppm concentration. The optimal design for a large-size diffusion plate inside a diffusive solar cell window by taking indoor lighting into account was suggested based on the simulation results.

Methodological comparison on hybrid nano organic solar cell fabrication

Science.gov (United States)

Vairavan, Rajendaran; Hambali, Nor Azura Malini Ahmad; Wahid, Mohamad Halim Abd; Retnasamy, Vithyacharan; Shahimin, Mukhzeer Mohamad

2018-02-01

The development of low cost solar cells has been the main focus in recent years. This has lead to the generation of photovoltaic cells based on hybrid of nanoparticle-organic polymer materials. This type of hybrid photovoltaic cells can overcome the problem of polymeric devices having low optical absorption and carrier mobilities. The hybrid cell has the potential of bridging the efficiency gap, which in present in organic and inorganic semiconductor materials. This project focuses on obtaining an hybrid active layer consisting of nanoparticles and organic polymer, to understand the parameter involved in obtaining this active layer and finally to investigate if the addition of nano particles in to the active layer could enhance the output of the hybrid solar cell. The hybrid active layer have will be deposited using the spin coating technique by using CdTe, CdS nano particles mixed with poly (2-methoxy,5-(2-ethyl-hexyloxy)-p-phenylvinylene)MEH-PPV.

Characterization of multicrystalline solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Malik, A.Q.; Chong Chew Hah; Chan Siang Khwang; Tan Kha Sheng; Lim Chee Ming

2006-01-01

The evaluation and assessment of the performance of photovoltaic (PV) cells in terms of measurable parameters requires the measurement of the current as a function of voltage, temperature, intensity, wind speed and spectrum. Most noticeable of all these parameters in the PV conversion efficiency η, defined as the maximum electrical power P max produced by the PV cell divided by the incident photon power P in which is measured with respect to standard test conditions (Sc). These conditions refer to the spectrum (AM 1.5), solar radiation intensity (1000 Wm -2 ), cell temperature (25 ± 2 degree C) and wind speed (2 mph). Tests under STC are carried out in the laboratory at a controlled environment. There have been several studies that analyze uncertainties in the laboratory measurement of solar cell efficiencies using different solar simulators and their transference to operational situations. Our preliminary results demonstrate that the short circuit current (I SC ) of the solar cell decreases when irradiance is less than 1000 Wm -2 irrespective of the working temperature of the cell

Characterisation of multicrystalline solar cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

A.Q. Malik

2017-10-01

Full Text Available The evaluation and assessment of the performance of photovoltaic (PV cells in terms of measurable parameters requires the measurement of the current as a function of voltage, temperature, intensity, wind speed and spectrum. Mo st noticeable of all these parameters is the PV conversion efficiency η, defined as the maximum electrical power Pmax produced by the PV cell divided by the incident photon power P in which is measured with respect to standard test conditions (STC. These conditions refer to the spectrum (AM 1.5, solar radiation intensity (1000 Wm-2, cell temperature (25 ±2oC and wind speed (2 mph. Tests under STC are carried out in the laboratory at a controlled environment. There have been several studies that analyze uncertainties in the laboratory measurement of solar cell efficiencies using different solar simulators and their transference to operational situations. Our preliminary results demonstratethat the short circuit current (ISC of the solar cell decreases when irradiance is less than 1000 Wm-2 irrespective of the working temperature of the cell.

Perovskite Solar Cells: Progress and Advancements

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Naveen Kumar Elumalai

2016-10-01

Full Text Available Organic–inorganic hybrid perovskite solar cells (PSCs have emerged as a new class of optoelectronic semiconductors that revolutionized the photovoltaic research in the recent years. The perovskite solar cells present numerous advantages include unique electronic structure, bandgap tunability, superior charge transport properties, facile processing, and low cost. Perovskite solar cells have demonstrated unprecedented progress in efficiency and its architecture evolved over the period of the last 5–6 years, achieving a high power conversion efficiency of about 22% in 2016, serving as a promising candidate with the potential to replace the existing commercial PV technologies. This review discusses the progress of perovskite solar cells focusing on aspects such as superior electronic properties and unique features of halide perovskite materials compared to that of conventional light absorbing semiconductors. The review also presents a brief overview of device architectures, fabrication methods, and interface engineering of perovskite solar cells. The last part of the review elaborates on the major challenges such as hysteresis and stability issues in perovskite solar cells that serve as a bottleneck for successful commercialization of this promising PV technology.

High Radiation Resistance IMM Solar Cell

Science.gov (United States)

Pan, Noren

2015-01-01

Due to high launch costs, weight reduction is a key driver for the development of new solar cell technologies suitable for space applications. This project is developing a unique triple-junction inverted metamorphic multijunction (IMM) technology that enables the manufacture of very lightweight, low-cost InGaAsP-based multijunction solar cells. This IMM technology consists of indium (In) and phosphorous (P) solar cell active materials, which are designed to improve the radiation-resistant properties of the triple-junction solar cell while maintaining high efficiency. The intrinsic radiation hardness of InP materials makes them of great interest for building solar cells suitable for deployment in harsh radiation environments, such as medium Earth orbit and missions to the outer planets. NASA Glenn's recently developed epitaxial lift-off (ELO) process also will be applied to this new structure, which will enable the fabrication of the IMM structure without the substrate.

Work Station For Inverting Solar Cells

Science.gov (United States)

Feder, H.; Frasch, W.

1982-01-01

Final work station along walking-beam conveyor of solar-array assembly line turns each pretabbed solar cell over, depositing it back-side-up onto landing pad, which centers cell without engaging collector surface. Solar cell arrives at inverting work station collector-side-up with two interconnect tabs attached to collector side. Cells are inverted so that second soldering operation takes place in plain view of operator. Inversion protects collector from damage when handled at later stages of assembly.

Analysis of Solar Energy Generation Capacity Using Hesitant Fuzzy Cognitive Maps

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Veysel Coban

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Solar energy is an important and reliable source of energy. Better understanding the concepts and relationships of the factors that affect solar energy generation capacity can enhance the usage of solar energy. This understanding can lead investors and governors in their solar power investments. However, solar power generation process is complicated, and the relations among the factors are vague and hesitant. In this paper, a hesitant fuzzy cognitive map for solar energy generation is developed and used for modeling and analyzing the ambiguous relations. The concepts and the relationships among them are defined by using expertsr opinions. Different scenarios are formed and evaluated with the proposed model.

Solar energy for steam generation in Brazil

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

De Carvalho, Jr, A V; Orlando, A DeF; Magnoli, D

1979-05-01

Steam generation is a solar energy application that has not been frequently studied in Brazil, even though for example, about 10% of the national primary energy demand is utilized for processing heat generation in the range of 100 to 125/sup 0/C. On the other hand, substitution of automotive gasoline by ethanol, for instance, has received much greater attention even though primary energy demand for process heat generation in the range of 100 to 125/sup 0/C is of the same order of magnitude than for total automotive gasoline production. Generation of low-temperature steam is analyzed in this article using distributed systems of solar collectors. Main results of daily performance simulation of single flat-plate collectors and concentrating collectors are presented for 20/sup 0/S latitude, equinox, in clear days. Flat plate collectors considered are of the aluminum roll-bond absorber type, selective surface single or double glazing. Considering feedwater at 20/sup 0/C, saturated steam at 120/sup 0/C and an annual solar utilization factor of 50%, a total collector area of about 3,000 m/sup 2/ is necessary for the 10 ton/day plant, without energy storage. A fuel-oil back-up system is employed to complement the solar steam production, when necessary. Preliminary economic evaluation indicates that, although the case-study shows today a long payback period relative to subsidized fuel oil in the domestic market (over 20 years in the city of Rio de Janeiro), solar steam systems may be feasible in the medium term due to projected increase of fuel oil price in Brazil.

Steam generator design for solar towers using solar salt as heat transfer fluid

Science.gov (United States)

González-Gómez, Pedro Ángel; Petrakopoulou, Fontina; Briongos, Javier Villa; Santana, Domingo

2017-06-01

Since the operation of a concentrating solar power plant depends on the intermittent character of solar energy, the steam generator is subject to daily start-ups, stops and load variations. Faster start-up and load changes increase the plant flexibility and the daily energy production. However, it involves high thermal stresses on thick-walled components. Continuous operational conditions may eventually lead to a material failure. For these reasons, it is important to evaluate the transient behavior of the proposed designs in order to assure the reliability. The aim of this work is to analyze different steam generator designs for solar power tower plants using molten salt as heat transfer fluid. A conceptual steam generator design is proposed and associated heat transfer areas and steam drum size are calculated. Then, dynamic models for the main parts of the steam generator are developed to represent its transient performance. A temperature change rate that ensures safe hot start-up conditions is studied for the molten salt. The thermal stress evolution on the steam drum is calculated as key component of the steam generator.

Semi-transparent solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sun, J; Jasieniak, J J

2017-01-01

Semi-transparent solar cells are a type of technology that combines the benefits of visible light transparency and light-to-electricity conversion. One of the biggest opportunities for such technologies is in their integration as windows and skylights within energy-sustainable buildings. Currently, such building integrated photovoltaics (BIPV) are dominated by crystalline silicon based modules; however, the opaque nature of silicon creates a unique opportunity for the adoption of emerging photovoltaic candidates that can be made truly semi-transparent. These include: amorphous silicon-, kesterite-, chalcopyrite-, CdTe-, dye-sensitized-, organic- and perovskite- based systems. For the most part, amorphous silicon has been the workhorse in the semi-transparent solar cell field owing to its established, low-temperature fabrication processes. Excitement around alternative classes, particularly perovskites and the inorganic candidates, has recently arisen because of the major efficiency gains exhibited by these technologies. Importantly, each of these presents unique opportunities and challenges within the context of BIPV. This topic review provides an overview into the broader benefits of semi-transparent solar cells as building-integrated features, as well as providing the current development status into all of the major types of semi-transparent solar cells technologies. (topical review)

Semi-transparent solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Sun, J.; Jasieniak, J. J.

2017-03-01

Semi-transparent solar cells are a type of technology that combines the benefits of visible light transparency and light-to-electricity conversion. One of the biggest opportunities for such technologies is in their integration as windows and skylights within energy-sustainable buildings. Currently, such building integrated photovoltaics (BIPV) are dominated by crystalline silicon based modules; however, the opaque nature of silicon creates a unique opportunity for the adoption of emerging photovoltaic candidates that can be made truly semi-transparent. These include: amorphous silicon-, kesterite-, chalcopyrite-, CdTe-, dye-sensitized-, organic- and perovskite- based systems. For the most part, amorphous silicon has been the workhorse in the semi-transparent solar cell field owing to its established, low-temperature fabrication processes. Excitement around alternative classes, particularly perovskites and the inorganic candidates, has recently arisen because of the major efficiency gains exhibited by these technologies. Importantly, each of these presents unique opportunities and challenges within the context of BIPV. This topic review provides an overview into the broader benefits of semi-transparent solar cells as building-integrated features, as well as providing the current development status into all of the major types of semi-transparent solar cells technologies.

Double Ion Implantation and Pulsed Laser Melting Processes for Third Generation Solar Cells

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Eric García-Hemme

2013-01-01

Full Text Available In the framework of the third generation of photovoltaic devices, the intermediate band solar cell is one of the possible candidates to reach higher efficiencies with a lower processing cost. In this work, we introduce a novel processing method based on a double ion implantation and, subsequently, a pulsed laser melting (PLM process to obtain thicker layers of Ti supersaturated Si. We perform ab initio theoretical calculations of Si impurified with Ti showing that Ti in Si is a good candidate to theoretically form an intermediate band material in the Ti supersaturated Si. From time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectroscopy measurements, we confirm that we have obtained a Ti implanted and PLM thicker layer of 135 nm. Transmission electron microscopy reveals a single crystalline structure whilst the electrical characterization confirms the transport properties of an intermediate band material/Si substrate junction. High subbandgap absorption has been measured, obtaining an approximate value of 104 cm−1 in the photons energy range from 1.1 to 0.6 eV.

Polymer solar cells. Morphology-property-correlation; Polymere Solarzellen. Morphologie-Eigenschafts-Korrelation

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Erb, Tobias

2008-09-22

The aim of the presented dissertation is to clarify open questions concerning the development and control of the morphology in the active layer of polymer bulk heterojunction solar cells. The new findings hereby derived shall modify the existing models of the active layer morphology as found in today's literature. The experimental investigations were performed by X-ray diffraction, spectroscopic ellipsometry, and photoluminescence spectroscopy. In addition to those methods, light microscopy and differential scanning calorimetry were applied to investigate three chosen material systems: P3HT/PCBM-C{sub 60}, P3HT/MDHE-C{sub 60}, and P3HT/(MDHE){sub 2}-C{sub 60}. On the basis of experimental results a morphological model is developed, which is discussed in the context of existing literature. The solar cells were electrically characterised by current-voltage and external quantum efficiency measurements. The structural model is set into relation with photovoltaic parameters of the polymer solar cell, such as short circuit photocurrent, open circuit voltage, fill factor, and power conversion efficiency. This contributes to the explanation and analysis of the electrical properties of the organic solar cell as a device. In summary, this work yields morphology-property-relations that are able to explain the interaction between physical properties, such as light absorption, charge carrier generation, and transport, with the morphology present within the active layer. Finally, the three investigated systems are compared and evaluated with respect to their applicability in polymer solar cells. Further on, the morphology-propertyrelations are used to develop a strategy to estimate the suitability of new twocomponent polymer-fullerene donor-acceptor systems for polymer solar cells. Based on these findings it becomes possible to evaluate the optimization potential for new materials. In conclusion, this helps to develop polymer solar cells with increased power conversion

Nanowire Structured Hybrid Cell for Concurrently Scavenging Solar and Mechanical Energies

KAUST Repository

Xu, Chen

2009-04-29

Conversion cells for harvesting solar energy and mechanical energy are usually separate and independent entities that are designed and built following different physical principles. Developing a technology that harvests multiple-type energies in forms such as sun light and mechanical around the clock is desperately desired for fully utilizing the energies available in our living environment. We report a hybrid cell that is intended for simultaneously harvesting solar and mechanical energies. Using aligned ZnO nanowire arrays grown on surfaces of a flat substrate, a dye-sensitized solar cell is integrated with a piezoelectric nanogenerator. The former harvests solar energy irradiating on the top, and the latter harvests ultrasonic wave energy from the surrounding. The two energy harvesting approaches can work simultaneously or individually, and they can be integrated in parallel and serial for raising the output current and voltage, respectively, as well as power. It is found that the voltage output from the solar cell can be used to raise the output voltage of the nanogenerator, providing an effective approach for effectively storing and utilizing the power generated by the nanogenerator. Our study demonstrates a new approach for concurrently harvesting multiple types of energies using an integrated hybrid cell so that the energy resources can be effectively and complementary utilized whenever and wherever one or all of them is available. © 2009 American Chemical Society.

Investigations on quinquethiophenes as donor materials in organic solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Schulze, Kerstin

2008-01-01

Organic photovoltaics could in the future represent a possibility for energy production from renewable energy sources. The advance consists here first of all in the potential of a very reasonable fabrication, for instance a production in the role-to-role procedurre, which can be prusued so on flexible substrates like for instance foils. Although the material costs are low, until the commercialization of organic solar cells among others an increasement of their power efficiency is necessary. Preferably in organic solar cells donor and acceptor materials should be applied, the absorption spectra and energy levels of which are ideally matched, because so can high zero-current voltages be reached. Additionally high absorption coefficents of the materials over a large spectral range can lead to high current densities in these photovoltaic components. In this thesis novel quinquethiophenes as donors in organic solar cells are studied, which consist as basic unit of five thiophene rings as well as dicyanovinyl end groups and alkyl side chains. The studied materials possess a high absorption coefficient and reach because of the high ionization potential high zero-current voltages in organic solar cells under application of the fullerenet C 60 as acceptor. Simultaneously a efficient separation of the excitons on the acceptor-donor interface occurs. However the high ionization potential of the quinquethiophenes puts special requirements to the further solar-cell structure. Within this thesis it is shown that adifference between internal voltage and zero-current voltage influences decidingly the shape of the solar-cell characteristic and can generate a S-shape in the neighbourhood of the zero-current voltage. The internal voltage is hereby determined by the contacting of the photoactive layers. An increasement of the internal voltage of the solar cell can be reached by a corresponding material choice. So in this thesis it is shown that organic solar cells based on these

Low-cost photovoltaics: Luminescent solar concentrators and colloidal quantum dot solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Leow, Shin Woei

Solar energy has long been lauded as an inexhaustible fuel source with more energy reaching the earth's surface in one hour than the global consumption for a year. Although capable of satisfying the world's energy requirements, solar energy remains an expensive technology that has yet to attain grid parity. Another drawback is that existing solar farms require large quantities of land in order to generate power at useful rates. In this work, we look to luminescent solar concentrator systems and quantum dot technology as viable solutions to lowering the cost of solar electricity production with the flexibility to integrate such technologies into buildings to achieve dual land use. Luminescent solar concentrator (LSC) windows with front-facing photovoltaic (PV) cells were built and their gain and power efficiency were investigated. Conventional LSCs employ a photovoltaic (PV) cell that is placed on the edge of the LSC, facing inward. This work describes a new design with the PV cells on the front-face allowing them to receive both direct solar irradiation and wave-guided photons emitted from a dye embedded in an acrylic sheet, which is optically coupled to the PV cells. Parameters investigated include the thickness of the waveguide, edge treatment of the window, cell width, and cell placement. The data allowed us to make projections that aided in designing windows for maximized overall efficiency. A gain in power of 2.2x over the PV cells alone was obtained with PV cell coverage of 5%, and a power conversion efficiency as high as 6.8% was obtained with a PV cell coverage of 31%. Balancing the trade-offs between gain and efficiency, the design with the lowest cost per watt attained a power efficiency of 3.8% and a gain of 1.6x. With the viability of the LSC demonstrated, a weighted Monte-Carlo Ray Tracing program was developed to study the transport of photons and loss mechanisms in the LSC to aid in design optimization. The program imports measured absorption

Thin-film solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Aberle, Armin G.

2009-01-01

The rapid progress that is being made with inorganic thin-film photovoltaic (PV) technologies, both in the laboratory and in industry, is reviewed. While amorphous silicon based PV modules have been around for more than 20 years, recent industrial developments include the first polycrystalline silicon thin-film solar cells on glass and the first tandem solar cells based on stacks of amorphous and microcrystalline silicon films ('micromorph cells'). Significant thin-film PV production levels are also being set up for cadmium telluride and copper indium diselenide.

Thermodynamics, Entropy, Information and the Efficiency of Solar Cells

Science.gov (United States)

Abrams, Zeev R.

-Queisser limit, known as "3rd generation" concepts. After analyzing the standard single-junction cell, other forms of surpassing the detailed-balance limit are presented and discussed, from the viewpoint of entropy and its relation to the amount of information lost or produced in the photovoltaic conversion process. In addition to the well-known 3rd generation methods: up- and down-conversion, carrier multiplication and intermediate band solar cells, other ideas are discussed such as using Feedback to shift the optimal bandgap of the cell, and the use of spectral splitting to completely utilize the solar spectrum. The focus on entropy (and the open-circuit voltage) as the primary variable of interest uncovers new limitations to these processes, and denotes preferences of certain technologies over others. Using this parallel approach provides insights into the field that were either neglected or not realized. This work thus provides a new set of guidelines for searching for and analyzing innovative techniques to maximize the power conversion efficiency from solar cells.

Modeling and control of a small solar fuel cell hybrid energy system

Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

LI Wei; ZHU Xin-jian; CAO Guang-yi

2007-01-01

This paper describes a solar photovoltaic fuel cell (PVEC) hybrid generation system consisting of a photovoltaic (PV) generator, a proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC), an electrolyser, a supercapacitor, a storage gas tank and power conditioning unit (PCU). The load is supplied from the PV generator with a fuel cell working in parallel. Excess PV energy when available is converted to hydrogen using an electrolyser for later use in the fuel cell. The individual mathematical model for each component is presented. Control strategy for the system is described. MATLAB/Simulink is used for the simulation of this highly nonlinear hybrid energy system. The simulation results are shown in the paper.

Photoexcitation dynamics in organic solar cell donor/acceptor system

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Aarnio, H.

2012-07-01

In this work, photoinduced absorption techniques have been used in a number of ways to clarify the charge generation and recombination processes in two polymers used in organic solar cells, namely APFO3 and P3HT. Emphasis has been on identifying photoexcitations, modeling their dynamics and determining their lifetimes.

Silicon nanowire-based solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Stelzner, Th; Pietsch, M; Andrae, G; Falk, F; Ose, E; Christiansen, S [Institute of Photonic Technology, Albert-Einstein-Strasse 9, D-07745 Jena (Germany)], E-mail: thomas.stelzner@ipht-jena.de

2008-07-23

The fabrication of silicon nanowire-based solar cells on silicon wafers and on multicrystalline silicon thin films on glass is described. The nanowires show a strong broadband optical absorption, which makes them an interesting candidate to serve as an absorber in solar cells. The operation of a solar cell is demonstrated with n-doped nanowires grown on a p-doped silicon wafer. From a partially illuminated area of 0.6 cm{sup 2} open-circuit voltages in the range of 230-280 mV and a short-circuit current density of 2 mA cm{sup -2} were obtained.

Silicon nanowire-based solar cells

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Stelzner, Th; Pietsch, M; Andrae, G; Falk, F; Ose, E; Christiansen, S

2008-01-01

The fabrication of silicon nanowire-based solar cells on silicon wafers and on multicrystalline silicon thin films on glass is described. The nanowires show a strong broadband optical absorption, which makes them an interesting candidate to serve as an absorber in solar cells. The operation of a solar cell is demonstrated with n-doped nanowires grown on a p-doped silicon wafer. From a partially illuminated area of 0.6 cm 2 open-circuit voltages in the range of 230-280 mV and a short-circuit current density of 2 mA cm -2 were obtained

Hot wire deposited hydrogenated amorphous silicon solar cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Mahan, A.H.; Iwaniczko, E.; Nelson, B.P.; Reedy, R.C. Jr.; Crandall, R.S. [National Renewable Energy Lab., Golden, CO (United States)

1996-05-01

This paper details the results of a study in which low H content, high deposition rate hot wire (HW) deposited amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) has been incorporated into a substrate solar cell. The authors find that the treatment of the top surface of the HW i layer while it is being cooled from its high deposition temperature is crucial to device performance. They present data concerning these surface treatments, and correlate these treatments with Schottky device performance. The authors also present first generation HW n-i-p solar cell efficiency data, where a glow discharge (GD) {mu}c-Si(p) layer was added to complete the partial devices. No light trapping layer was used to increase the device Jsc. Their preliminary investigations have yielded efficiencies of up to 6.8% for a cell with a 4000 {Angstrom} thick HW i-layer, which degrade less than 10% after a 900 hour light soak. The authors suggest avenues for further improvement of their devices.

Realistic generation cost of solar photovoltaic electricity

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Singh, Parm Pal; Singh, Sukhmeet

2010-01-01

Solar photovoltaic (SPV) power plants have long working life with zero fuel cost and negligible maintenance cost but requires huge initial investment. The generation cost of the solar electricity is mainly the cost of financing the initial investment. Therefore, the generation cost of solar electricity in different years depends on the method of returning the loan. Currently levelized cost based on equated payment loan is being used. The static levelized generation cost of solar electricity is compared with the current value of variable generation cost of grid electricity. This improper cost comparison is inhibiting the growth of SPV electricity by creating wrong perception that solar electricity is very expensive. In this paper a new method of loan repayment has been developed resulting in generation cost of SPV electricity that increases with time like that of grid electricity. A generalized capital recovery factor has been developed for graduated payment loan in which capital and interest payment in each installment are calculated by treating each loan installment as an independent loan for the relevant years. Generalized results have been calculated which can be used to determine the cost of SPV electricity for a given system at different places. Results show that for SPV system with specific initial investment of 5.00 cents /kWh/year, loan period of 30 years and loan interest rate of 4% the levelized generation cost of SPV electricity with equated payment loan turns out to be 28.92 cents /kWh, while the corresponding generation cost with graduated payment loan with escalation in annual installment of 8% varies from 9.51 cents /kWh in base year to 88.63 cents /kWh in 30th year. So, in this case, the realistic current generation cost of SPV electricity is 9.51 cents /kWh and not 28.92 cents /kWh. Further, with graduated payment loan, extension in loan period results in sharp decline in cost of SPV electricity in base year. Hence, a policy change is required

Berkeley Lab Sheds Light on Improving Solar Cell Efficiency

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

2007-01-01

Typical manufacturing methods produce solar cells with an efficiency of 12-15%; and 14% efficiency is the bare minimum for achieving a profit. In work performed at the Ernest Orlando Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley, CA, 5 10-486-577 1)--a US Department of Energy national laboratory that conducts unclassified scientific research and is managed by the University of California--scientist Scott McHugo has obtained keen insights into the impaired performance of solar cells manufactured from polycrystalline silicon. The solar cell market is potentially vast, according to Berkeley Lab. Lightweight solar panels are highly beneficial for providing electrical power to remote locations in developing nations, since there is no need to build transmission lines or truck-in generator fuel. Moreover, industrial nations confronted with diminishing resources have active programs aimed at producing improved, less expensive solar cells. 'In a solar cell, there is a junction between p-type silicon and an n-type layer, such as diffused-in phosphorous', explained McHugo, who is now with Berkeley Lab's Accelerator and Fusion Research Division. 'When sunlight is absorbed, it frees electrons, which start migrating in a random-walk fashion toward that junction. If the electrons make it to the junction; they contribute to the cell's output of electric current. Often, however, before they reach the junction, they recombine at specific sites in the crystal' (and, therefore, cannot contribute to current output). McHugo scrutinized a map of a silicon wafer in which sites of high recombination appeared as dark regions. Previously, researchers had shown that such phenomena occurred not primarily at grain boundaries in the polycrystalline material, as might be expected, but more often at dislocations in the crystal. However, the dislocations themselves were not the problem. Using a unique heat treatment technique, McHugo performed electrical measurements to investigate the material

Challenges in amorphous silicon solar cell technology

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Swaaij, van R.A.C.M.M.; Zeman, M.; Korevaar, B.A.; Smit, C.; Metselaar, J.W.; Sanden, van de M.C.M.

2000-01-01

Hydrogenated amorphous silicon is nowadays extensively used for a range of devices, amongst others solar cells, Solar cell technology has matured over the last two decades and resulted in conversion efficiencies in excess of 15%. In this paper the operation of amorphous silicon solar cells is

High Efficiency Multijunction Solar Cells with Finely-Tuned Quantum Wells

Science.gov (United States)

Varonides, Argyrios C.

The field of high efficiency (inorganic) photovoltaics (PV) is rapidly maturing in both efficiency goals and cover all cost reduction of fabrication. On one hand, know-how from space industry in new solar cell design configurations and on the other, fabrication cost reduction challenges for terrestrial uses of solar energy, have paved the way to a new generation of PV devices, capable of capturing most of the solar spectrum. For quite a while now, the goal of inorganic solar cell design has been the total (if possible) capture-absorption of the solar spectrum from a single solar cell, designed in such a way that a multiple of incident wavelengths could be simultaneously absorbed. Multi-absorption in device physics indicates parallel existence of different materials that absorb solar photons of different energies. Bulk solid state devices absorb at specific energy thresholds, depending on their respective energy gap (EG). More than one energy gaps would on principle offer new ways of photon absorption: if such a structure could be fabricated, two or more groups of photons could be absorbed simultaneously. The point became then what lattice-matched semiconductor materials could offer such multiple levels of absorption without much recombination losses. It was soon realized that such layer multiplicity combined with quantum size effects could lead to higher efficiency collection of photo-excited carriers. At the moment, the main reason that slows down quantum effect solar cell production is high fabrication cost, since it involves primarily expensive methods of multilayer growth. Existing multi-layer cells are fabricated in the bulk, with three (mostly) layers of lattice-matched and non-lattice-matched (pseudo-morphic) semiconductor materials (GaInP/InGaN etc), where photo-carrier collection occurs in the bulk of the base (coming from the emitter which lies right under the window layer). These carriers are given excess to conduction via tunnel junction (grown between

Interplay between efficiency and device architecture for small molecule organic solar cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Williams, Graeme; Sutty, Sibi; Aziz, Hany

2014-06-21

Small molecule organic solar cells (OSCs) have experienced a resurgence of interest over their polymer solar cell counterparts, owing to their improved batch-to-batch (thus, cell-to-cell) reliability. In this systematic study on OSC device architecture, we investigate five different small molecule OSC structures, including the simple planar heterojunction (PHJ) and bulk heterojunction (BHJ), as well as several planar-mixed structures. The different OSC structures are studied over a wide range of donor:acceptor mixing concentrations to gain a comprehensive understanding of their charge transport behavior. Transient photocurrent decay measurements provide crucial information regarding the interplay between charge sweep-out and charge recombination, and ultimately hint toward space charge effects in planar-mixed structures. Results show that the BHJ/acceptor architecture, comprising a BHJ layer with high C60 acceptor content, generates OSCs with the highest performance by balancing charge generation with charge collection. The performance of other device architectures is largely limited by hole transport, with associated hole accumulation and space charge effects.

Possibility of EV with solar cells on the new traffic system; Shinkotsu system ni okeru solar car no kanosei

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Fujii, I; Kojima, S [Meiji University, Tokyo (Japan)

1997-11-25

A possibility of a new traffic system was studied for a solar car which is light in weight, small in size and low in speed (cruising speed: 20 km/h) and does not need so much power because of the use for short distance. In the new traffic system, people travel short distance in city by solar car, and use trains for travel between cities. By installing solar cells on roofs, etc. of houses and buildings such as garages around stations, power needed for solar car and incidentally required can be supplied. Assuming the short distance transportation, the car is for one person with a height of luggage space of 70cm, mean length of 165cm, and floor height of 50cm above the ground. In case that the power generation by solar cells (256.5W) is at maximum with no shading during travel on conditions of load weight of 10kg, personnel weight of 70kg, and total weight of 250kg, it was found that solar cells can supply 89% of the required output under test road travel at speed of 20 km/h. A viability of the solar car proposed here is great. A possibility at the time of mode road travel is also studied. 10 refs., 3 figs., 1 tab.

Effects of Frequency Dependence of the External Quantum Efficiency of Perovskite Solar Cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Ravishankar, Sandheep; Aranda, Clara; Boix, Pablo P; Anta, Juan A; Bisquert, Juan; Garcia-Belmonte, Germà

2018-06-07

Perovskite solar cells are known to show very long response time scales, on the order of milliseconds to seconds. This generates considerable doubt over the validity of the measured external quantum efficiency (EQE) and consequently the estimation of the short-circuit current density. We observe a variation as high as 10% in the values of the EQE of perovskite solar cells for different optical chopper frequencies between 10 and 500 Hz, indicating a need to establish well-defined protocols of EQE measurement. We also corroborate these values and obtain new insights regarding the working mechanisms of perovskite solar cells from intensity-modulated photocurrent spectroscopy measurements, identifying the evolution of the EQE over a range of frequencies, displaying a singular reduction at very low frequencies. This reduction in EQE is ascribed to additional resistive contributions hindering charge extraction in the perovskite solar cell at short-circuit conditions, which are delayed because of the concomitant large low-frequency capacitance.

Optoelectronic processes at polymer-fullerene heterojunctions : charge transfer states in organic solar cells

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Di Nuzzo, D.

2012-01-01

Polymer photovoltaic cells currently achieve power conversion efficiencies (PCE) above 10% on lab scale. To compete with the efficiencies above 20% of inorganic solar cells, understanding and elimination of all the loss channels is necessary. This thesis investigates charge generation and

Economic aspects of grid connected solar electricity generation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pharabod, F.

1993-01-01

Experience gained with available solar thermal technologies enlighten on options for research and development on solar electricity generation. The proposed analysis of new solar technologies concerns market, costs and profit viewpoint: - Systems under development have to fit with consumers' needs and utilities' specifications, technology is not the only item to study. - Expense headings depend on technological options and operation procedures such as size of the plant, solar only or hybrid concept. - Anticipation of revenues highly depends on direct insolation quality and on local conditions for introducing the electric power generated into the network: daily direct insolation measurements and annual local load curve are prerequisite data. Strategic advantages regarding environment and sustainable development are to be pointed out, specially in industrialized countries or for projects including financing institutions. As far as generating electric power on the grid is a major challenge in the development of a number of countries in the sun belt, cooperation between industrialized and developing countries, under the auspices of international organization, has to be promoted. (Author) 12 refs

Steam generation from solar energy

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gozzi, M.

2001-01-01

The vapor for thermoelectric use is one of the most promoted methods for electric power generation from solar energy. The new plants are becoming more and more safe, and anyway in some cases the natural gas makes easy the production of electricity [it

Surface Passivation for Silicon Heterojunction Solar Cells

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Deligiannis, D.

2017-01-01

Silicon heterojunction solar cells (SHJ) are currently one of the most promising solar cell technologies in the world. The SHJ solar cell is based on a crystalline silicon (c-Si) wafer, passivated on both sides with a thin intrinsic hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) layer. Subsequently, p-type

Application of photoluminescence imaging and laser-beam-induced-current mapping in thin film solar cell characterization

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Liu, Geyuan [Iowa State Univ., Ames, IA (United States)

2017-05-06

My research projects are focused on application of photonics, optics and micro- fabrication technology in energy related fields. Photonic crystal fabrication research has the potential to help us generate and use light more efficiently. In order to fabricate active 3D woodpile photonic structure devices, a woodpile template is needed to enable the crystal growth process. We developed a silica woodpile template fabrication process based on two polymer transfer molding technique. A silica woodpile template is demonstrated to work with temperature up to 900 C. It provides a more economical way to explore making better 3D active woodpile photonic devices like 3D photonic light emitting diodes (LED). Optical research on solar cell testing has the potential to make our energy generation more e cient and greener. PL imaging and LBIC mapping are used to measure CdTe solar cells with different back contacts. A strong correlation between PL image defects and LBIC map defects is observed. This opens up potential application for PL imaging in fast solar cell inspection. 2D laser IV scan shows its usage in 2D parameter mapping. We show its ability to generate important information about solar cell performance locally around PL image defects.

High efficiency copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS) thin film solar cells

Science.gov (United States)

Rajanikant, Ray Jayminkumar

The generation of electrical current from the solar radiation is known as the photovoltaic effect. Solar cell, also known as photovoltaic (PV) cell, is a device that works on the principle of photovoltaic effect, and is widely used for the generation of electricity. Thin film polycrystalline solar cells based on copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS) are admirable candidates for clean energy production with competitive prices in the near future. CIGS based polycrystalline thin film solar cells with efficiencies of 20.3 % and excellent temperature stability have already been reported at the laboratory level. The present study discusses about the fabrication of CIGS solar cell. Before the fabrication part of CIGS solar cell, a numerical simulation is carried out using One-Dimensional Analysis of Microelectronic and Photonic Structures (AMPS-ID) for understanding the physics of a solar cell device, so that an optimal structure is analyzed. In the fabrication part of CIGS solar cell, Molybdenum (Mo) thin film, which acts as a 'low' resistance metallic back contact, is deposited by RF magnetron sputtering on organically cleaned soda lime glass substrate. The major advantages for using Mo are high temperature, (greater than 600 °C), stability and inertness to CIGS layer (i.e., no diffusion of CIGS into Mo). Mo thin film is deposited at room temperature (RT) by varying the RF power and the working pressure. The Mo thin films deposited with 100 W RF power and 1 mTorr working pressure show a reflectivity of above average 50 % and the low sheet resistance of about 1 O/□. The p-type CIGS layer is deposited on Mo. Before making thin films of CIGS, a powder of CIGS material is synthesized using melt-quenching method. Thin films of CIGS are prepared by a single-stage flash evaporation process on glass substrates, initially, for optimization of deposition parameters and than on Mo coated glass substrates for device fabrication. CIGS thin film is deposited at 250 °C at a

Controlling the Electronic Interface Properties in Polymer-Fullerene Bulk-Heterojunction Solar Cells

OpenAIRE

Stubhan, Tobias

2014-01-01

The world consumes several tens of terawatts (TW) of electricity. If solar energy should have a notable share in the energy generation of the future, the fabrication of solar modules has to be changed from nowadays batch-to-batch processes that operate in the gigawatt regime to a reliable production that allows TW`s. Large area roll-to-roll (R2R) printing enables solar cell manufacturing to proceed to TW production. Organic photovoltaics (OPV) are one of the very promising technologies for...

Assessment of the dye-sensitized solar cell