Solar Photovoltaic Technology Marketing Summaries

The Theoretical Overlay Photographic Heliostat Alignment Technique (TOPHAT) is a unique method which helps to accurately and effectively concentrate solar energy onto a receiver. By utilizing a camera/target fixture placed in front of the heliostat TOPHAT aligns and focuses the mirrors on a heliostat. It uses the photographs taken by cameras on the fixture and comparing the location and size of the target patterns with their predicted theoretical images. Adjustments are made to the facets... read more

Smart windows, such as electrochromic or thermochromic windows, can intelligently regulate their transparency, allowing for control of transmitted light or heat into building interiors.  In turn, control of transmitted light and heat allows for improved energy efficiency and occupant comfort.  While electrochromic windows are user-controlled and change from a resting transparent state to a light-absorbing state when an external voltage is applied, thermochromic windows avoid the... read more

The process of photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting is a promising pathway for the generation of hydrogen due to its high conversion efficiency and potential for cost efficiency. Additionally, it is a renewable energy technology with relatively simple and inexpensive processes compared to other hydrogen production technologies. However, continued improvements in conversion efficiency, durability, and processing cost are needed to make the technology viable for use in the future... read more

An unexpected increase in the series resistance in a photovoltaic module can be a serious problem; not only does the increased resistance reduce current flow  - and hence power generation – from the cell, it can also be an indication of a component failure or other systemic flaw in the device. These failure mechanisms, including broken ribbons, failed solder bonds, or junction box contact issues, can be associated with excess heat and can pose a safety hazard in the device... read more

With the increased penetration of connected photovoltaic (PV) power systems in large-scale transmission grids and in consumer-scale distribution grids, the conventional rotating machines that have supplied rotational inertia and primary frequency regulation (PFR) on fast time scales are being displaced. The displacement of these conventional rotating machines threatens grid stability due to the time-intermittent outputs of PV plants.

The best way to mitigate the effects of PV energy... read more

Within the photovoltaic (PV) industry, the supply of the required metallurgical-grade (MG) Si feedstock at an acceptable cost is a pain point for manufacturers. One current method for the production and purification of this feedstock is the repetitive porous MG-Si etching, gettering, and surface removal of impurities. While this method is effective in the near-surface region, this process is impractical for the bulk purification of MG-Si feedstock due to the large number of process cycles... read more

Silicon solar cells have advantages over other solar cells materials in that they are generally less expensive and require fewer steps to manufacture than III-V solar cells, yet are more efficient than today’s thin film materials.  Nevertheless, the efficiency of Si solar cells has historically been limited by carrier recombination losses, particularly at the surface of the cell and at the metal contact interfaces. One approach to reduce recombination losses at the contact... read more

To improve solar cell conversion efficiency, researchers have been focused on making improvements to cell contacts in order to decrease the level of carrier recombination at the cell interface. One way to reduce carrier recombination is to passivate the surface of the cell. Surface passivation generally involves either applying another material onto the surface of the cell or doping the silicon wafer, which may be achieved through a variety of means including ion implantation. While ion... read more

Indium Phosphide (InP) is a semiconductor compound typically used in solar cells and high speed electronics. InP has a number of performance benefits compared to other III-V materials due to its higher mean and peak saturation velocities, which result in optoelectronic devices with higher frequency. InP solar cells, with a bandgap of 1.34 eV and high absorption levels, have a strong potential of reaching the Shockley-Queisser theoretical efficiency level of approximately 33%. Despite this... read more

The global market for solar technology is expected to grow by 21% in 2016 to reach a total of 66 GW. With demand for solar cells increasing, there is a renewed focus on improving energy conversion efficiency. One major problem for energy conversion in solar cells is the loss of solar energy due to the high refractive index of silicon. An effective way to reduce the reflective property of silicon is through surface texturing, or etching, which may improve the amount of photon absorption in... read more

Matching a semiconductor’s bandgap to incident photon energy is a well-known method to achieve the most efficient photovoltaic devices.  Since solar radiation consists of a wide range of wavelengths, having one semiconductor with a single bandgap to absorb all solar radiation is highly inefficient.  As such, the use of tandem or multi-bandgap converters having two or more discrete bandgaps to match different wavelengths of solar radiation has led to ultra-high efficiency... read more

The desire to improve grid resiliency and enable a sustainable capacity expansion has led to the growth of distributed energy resources (DERs) and the utilization of renewable energy sources. DER allows for smaller amounts of aggregate energy to meet the regular demand of the commercial, industrial, and domestic consumers. When combined with renewable energy sources, the distribution network supplying power is transformed into a smarter and more sustainable grid.

One major challenge in a... read more

With growing numbers of solar energy systems being proposed and installed throughout the United States, the potential impact of glint and glare from photovoltaic modules, concentrating solar collectors, receivers, and other components is receiving increased attention as a potential hazard or distraction for pilots, air-traffic control personnel, motorists, and residents. Hazards from reflection of solar radiation from solar power plants include the potential for permanent eye injury (e.g.,... read more

Photovoltaic (PV) solar cell fabrication often involves the process of “co-firing” where metallic electrical conductors are mechanically and electrically coupled to semiconductor materials to create an electrical p-n semiconductor PV device. For example, during fabrication, an aluminum “ink” would be applied to a back surface (e.g. a p-type region) of a wafer of semiconductor material (such as a silicon wafer). The opposing front surface (e.g. an n-type... read more

Transparent conducting (TC) materials are extensively used in electronics and electronic device applications. Presently, the most commercially used material involves indium-tin oxides (ITO) that have an unequalled combination of transparency and conductivity. In general, the conductivity and transparency are inversely related in the most common forms of transparent conductors (i.e. transparent conducting oxides) and ITO provides an optimum balance between the two. However, since indium is a... read more

Radiative transfer (RT) models simulating broadband solar radiation have been widely used by atmospheric scientists to model solar resources for various energy applications such as operational forecasting. Due to the complexity of solving the RT equation, the computation under cloudy conditions can be extremely time consuming though many approximations (e.g. two-stream approach and delta-M truncation scheme) have been utilized. Thus, a more efficient RT model is crucial for model... read more

Wafers find a variety of uses in the semiconductor, solar energy and other industries. Wafer quality often depends on variables such as thickness and surface characteristics. Depending on end use, poor quality wafers may have uneven thickness or uneven surface characteristics; whereas, higher quality wafers may have substantially uniform thickness and substantially uniform surface characteristics. In the semiconductor industry, where wafers are used as a substrate, wafer quality can... read more

Semiconductor wafers are used for a variety of purposes in microelectronics, solar cell, and other industries. Wafer quality often depends on variables such as thickness and surface characteristics. Poor quality wafers may have uneven thickness or uneven surface characteristics; whereas, higher quality wafers will have substantially more uniform thickness and substantially more uniform surface characteristics. Wafer quality can dramatically influence the mechanical and/or electronic yield of... read more

Permeation generally occurs by a three-step process. The analyte (e.g., water vapor, oxygen, carbon dioxide, hydrogen, hydrocarbon, or another gas) is absorbed into the surface of a permeable material. The analyte then diffuses through the permeable material and outgases from the other side. A permeation standard has a unique transmission rate for a particular analyte under specified testing conditions, such as temperature and relative humidity, so that the detection equipment may... read more

Photovoltaic (PV) module performance can be characterized by imaging using baseline and periodic images to track defects and degradation. Both thermal images, which can be acquired during sunny operating conditions, and photoluminescence (PL) images, which could be acquired at night, can be collected without electrical connection. Electroluminescence (EL) images, which are useful to detect many types of defects such as cracks, interconnect and solder faults, and resistances, have... read more

The ability to de-energize PV modules in the event of an emergency is of great interest for the firefighting community. A simple, low-cost method to do so involves integrating fault monitoring controls into the junction box of a PV module such that detection of a ground fault, either through local failure or intentional grounding for safety disconnect purposes will result in de-energization of the individual PV module.

Smart bypass diodes in a PV module are already designed to... read more

Quantum dot (QD) solids are a solution-processed, composite thin film semiconductor system that is being developed for optoelectronics (display technology, solid state lighting, next generation photovoltaics, photodetector application, etc.). For photovoltaics, in addition to being solution processable, QD solar cells (QDSCs) have a higher limiting single junction power conversion efficiency than is possible using conventional bulk or thin film semiconductors due to enhanced... read more

Polymer-based photovoltaic devices have received intense interest in recent years because of their potential to provide low-cost solar energy conversion, flexibility, manufacturability, and light weight.  However, the efficiency of organic solar cells is about 4-6%, and increasing this efficiency is critical for developing practical applications and commercially viable devices.  One approach to increasing efficiency is to increase the light absorption on the organic film without... read more

Thermophotovoltaic (TPV) devices can be used to generate power from photons, and consist of a thermal emitter and photodiode. These limitations of photovoltatic (PV) devices solar cells—since sunlight is composed of many different wavelengths, not all incident photons have an energy larger than the energy band gap (Eg) of the semiconducting material of the photodiode and thus, not all photons can contribute to the photo-current. If the thermal emitter of a TPV can absorb all incoming... read more

Scientists at Berkeley Lab have invented multiband gap semiconducting materials for developing solar cells that could achieve power conversion efficiencies of 50 percent or higher.

As the use of renewable energy sources increase, there is an increasing need for power converters capable of efficiently converting a diverse input of energy sources to a form suitable for insertion into modern electrical grid systems.  Current renewable energy conversion systems are bulky, inefficient, and generally incapable of efficiently accepting multiple inputs from a diverse pool of energy sources, such as produced by modern, renewable photovoltaic, geothermal and wind energy... read more

Polycrystalline copper indium gallium selenide (CuIn(1-x)GaxSe₂ or CIGS) based direct bandgap semiconductors are strong candidates for low cost, high-throughput solar energy harvesting thin film photovoltaic devices. State of the art CIGS devices demonstrate 15-18% power conversion efficiencies with best cell performance reaching 20.4%. However, this is well below the theoretical maximum of 32.8% predicted for the identical material composition with a 1.15 eV. The main reasons for this... read more

Iowa State University and Ames Laboratory researchers have developed a method for increasing the efficiency of conventional incandescent light bulbs.

Ames Laboratory researchers have developed a process for producing more efficient polymer solar cells by increasing light absorption through a thin and uniform light-absorbing layer deposited on a textured substrate. 

Photonic crystals are optical materials that can be used to control and manipulate the flow of light. Ames Laboratory researchers have developed a method for the producing photonic crystals that can be used as highly efficient light sources.

Encapsulant materials are used in a variety of applications to isolate components, areas, or other materials from potentially stressful conditions that can adversely affect the performance of a device. For example, the performance of photovoltaic (PV) modules may decrease over time as water penetrates the module and corrodes the metallic components essential for module function. In the absence of water, corrosion occurs relatively slowly because by-products are less able to diffuse away from... read more

The U.S. Department of Energy SunShot Initiative aims to reduce the total installed cost of solar energy systems to $.06 per kilowatt-hour (kWh) by the year 2020. Reducing the cost of solar electricity requires that solar cell modules become more efficient and much less expensive. Multijunction (MJ) solar cells present the best option for significantly increasing the absolute module efficiency beyond the single junction Schockley Queisser limit of 33%. To date, MJ solar cell designs have... read more

An apparatus for movably sealing a deposition chamber from the rest of a fabrication system under vacuum.

A high throughput thin film device manufacturing process that produces stable, high efficiency devices and, at the same time, limits environmental and occupational exposure to toxic compounds.
 

An instrument and method for depositing thin film alloys over large areas under vacuum. The key features stem from the use of close-space sublimation sources with independent valve and temperature control.

Apparatus and method for depositing thin films onto a substrate using an advanced thermal deposition technique.
 

A chemical process for producing complex ternary thin film alloys using evaporative deposition over large areas.
 

A device for evaporative deposition of thin films that offers more efficient heating and greater deposition control. Key features include an embedded heater element and a shutter system.

This innovation facilitates rapid cooling in a vacuum (from 200 ^oC to 25 ^oC) and greatly diminishes the time required to produce complex thin films requiring multiple deposition steps.

A chemical synthesis that modifies PAHs via addition of perfluoroalkyl groups. The resulting compounds are novel organic semiconductors with potential application to flexible OLED displays and organic photovoltaics (OPVs).
 

Scientists at Berkeley Lab have developed a method for fabricating conductive aluminum-doped zinc oxide (AZO) nanocrystals that provide a lower cost, less toxic, earth-abundant alternative to the widely used transparent conductive oxide (TCO) indium tin oxide while offering comparable optical and electronic properties. TCOs are used in devices such as flat screen displays, photovoltaic cells, photochromic windows, chemical sensors, and biosensors.

Transparent conducting oxides (TCOs) are utilized in a wide range of opto-electronic applications such as the manufacture of LCDs, touch panel devices, window coatings, and photovoltaic solar cells. Manufacturing involves depositing a metal oxide as the thin film on top of a substrate. Achieving the desired opto-electronic properties of the thin film is typically dependent on the amount of oxygen introduced during the deposition process as it produces a tradeoff between electrical... read more

The primary fuel powering new fuel cell technologies is hydrogen. The market for fuel cells is expected to grow tremendously in the near-term as vehicle manufacturers start mass-production of fuel cell vehicles. As the market for fuel cells grows, so too does demand for hydrogen to supply the fuel cells. The two biggest obstacles in the way of hydrogen production are high cost and storage of product. 

While there are multiple methods of hydrogen production,... read more

Revolutionary microsolar technology utilizes glitter-sized photovoltaic cells to change how we generate and use solar power. The significantly reduced size and 100 times less silicon used, allows for increased versatility of photovoltaic applications. Traditional solar cells are 6” square wafers which restricts location, performance, and manufacturing. Other unique factors to this technology include solar tracking, self assembly, and power management techniques.

Thin film solar cells have been the focus of many research facilities in recent years that are working to decrease manufacturing costs and increase cell efficiency. Cadmium telluride (CdTe) has been well recognized as a promising photovoltaic material for thin film solar cells because of its near-optimum bandgap of ~1.5 eV and its high absorption coefficient. Researchers at NREL have found a unique way to dramatically increase efficiencies of substrate-configured CdTe solar cells.

Substra... read more

A team of Berkeley Lab researchers has invented the first vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) growth technology yielding III-V photovoltaics. The photovoltaics achieve 25% power conversion efficiency at a cost significantly lower than current approaches due to the non-epitaxial processing approach and high material utilization rate.

This novel and inexpensive composition of cobalt molybdenum nitride offers high catalytic activity for the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) - a critical reaction in a number of growing energy generation and utilization technologies. For example, water electrolysis can transform electrical energy produced by solar cells into chemical fuels that can be more easily stored and transported. HER is one of the two half-reactions in water electrolysis, and the efficiency of catalysts directly... read more

A novel structure design for thin film organic photovoltaic (OPV) devices provides a system for increasing the optical absorption in the active layer. The waveguided structure permits reduction of the active layer thickness, resulting in enhanced charge collection and extraction, leading to improved power conversion efficiency compared to standard OPV devices.

Structures useful for forming contacts to materials having low charge carrier mobility are described. Methods for their formation and use are also described. These structures include interdigitated electrodes capable of making electrical contact to semiconducting materials having low electron and/or hole mobility. In particular, these structures are useful for organic semiconducting devices made with conducting polymers and small molecules. They are also useful for semiconducting devices... read more

A University of Colorado research group led by Fernando Mancilla-David has developed a low cost irradiance sensor using a network modeled on a neural network. In this approach, a trained NN algorithm uses a small number of PV cells arranged into a small sensing PV panel, as well as a temperature sensor and a low-cost microcontroller, to directly sense solar irradiance; this data can then be fed back into the MPP tracking algorithm to dynamically improve PV efficiency as conditions change.

... read more

Moisture barriers serve as a robust packaging solution to enclose moisture sensitive encapsulated materials. They enable a device, product, substrate, or apparatus which in use will be exposed to moisture, water vapor, freeze thaw cycles or other environmental elements that could compromise the longevity or integrity of the device or product. For example, a photovoltaic cell must able to withstand long durations of rain, snow, fog, dew, environmental contaminants or other substances. The... read more

There are many potential applications for high-performance devices fabricated using III-V materials, including high efficiency solar cells, solid-state lighting, and high-speed transistors. In each case, the specific device designs rely on combinations of various materials where the lattice mismatch between the different materials can introduce problems for device performance and the deposition processes can be cost-prohibitive. With each of these markets approaching multi-billion dollars... read more

NREL scientists have discovered a unique way to quickly grow epitaxial Si using hot-wire chemical vapor deposition (HWCVD), which holds the potential to greatly decrease costs within the manufacturing of Si substrates.  With NREL’s HWCVD technology, Si material use and costs are dramatically reduced with scalable manufacturing and lower deposition temperatures.  NREL’s unique HWCVD technique can easily be integrated into existing manufacturing processes, allowing... read more

The photovoltaic market remains dominated by silicon wafer-based solar cells. Therefore, there is a need for improvements in the manufacturing processes of first generation solar cells that can achieve higher conversion efficiency without exorbitant increases in production cost. Improvements to the minority charge carrier’s lifetime through new manufacturing methods offer the desired increase in overall efficiency without extreme capital costs. There is a need in the art of preparing... read more

To be commercially viable, superconducting materials used in various applications must have high critical current densities because high electrical current is required to power any significant load. It has been shown that superconducting materials formed with bi-axially textured layers have superior critical current densities. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory has developed electro-deposited, bi-axially textured buffer layers for depositing a superconducting material onto a substrate... read more

There are numerous options for renewable energy systems development. Location, size, type of system, and a number of other criteria need to be considered. The objective of this program is to determine the optimal size (capacity, Kilowatt (kW)) of a renewable energy generator, based on minimizing life cycle cost (LCC).

The reason for developing such a program is driven by three major issues. First, the need to evaluate a very large number (tens of thousands) of project opportunity sites.... read more

In order to increase the speed and scale of Renewable Energy (RE) solar project deployment on buildings, energy savings analysis and a strong business case is required. This software provides an hourly simulation to optimize rooftop area for combined solar photovoltaic (PV) and solar hot water (SHW) systems or solely PV. The program calculates energy savings, demand reduction, cost savings, C02 reduction, and building life cycle costs including: simple payback, discounted payback,... read more

The most common way of describing the quality of an existing or potential wind or solar power generation site is the total amount of energy expected to be generated based on typical weather patterns. This total amount of energy is characterized by the capacity factor (the ratio between the expected generated amounts to the maximum possible amount for hypothetical conditions of constantly blowing wind or sunshine for a 24 hour period). The capacity factor gives a correct estimate for the... read more

Berkeley Lab researcher Maxwell Zheng and colleagues have developed technologies for economic, high volume production of high optical quality polycrystalline indium phosphide (InP), with optical properties nearly identical to those of InP on single-crystal wafers, on low cost metallic substrates. The technologies reduce costs at both the growth stage and in downstream processing.

Traditionally, photosensitive optoelectronic devices such as solar cells have been constructed of a number of inorganic semiconductors. Purity and crystalline grain size are a large determinant of efficiency in these cells. The smaller the grains and the more impure the material, the lower the efficiency. The drawback to using these typical inorganic photovoltaic (PV) materials is that processing is often quite expensive and energy intensive. Pure monocrystalline silicon, currently a common... read more

Solar panels, or photovoltaic panels, use photovoltaic cells to create energy. These cells create direct current through absorption of sunlight's photons by silicon, allowing electrons to be stripped from atoms. The direct current is then inverted and either stored in a battery or immediately used for energy. The current silicon-based solar cells have a limiting efficiency of about 30% for a variety of reasons. Current cells can only absorb a portion of the light the sun produces, and... read more

A University of Colorado research group led by Rich Noble has developed a novel approach to dye-sensitized solar cells that increases solar-to-electrical energy conversion.

Semiconducting single wall carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) have unique electronic and optical properties for diverse optoelectronic applications, including photovoltaics, photodetectors and photoswitches. SWCNT-porphyrin molecular complexes are promising candidates for light harvesting applications, due to their long-lived charge separated states and efficient charge-transport behavior of SWCNTs. In the natural light-harvesting complexes, the electron transfer from the porphyrin pigment to the... read more

The solar industry has shown significant growth over the past decade. From 2002 to 2007 the market for Copper Indium Gallium Selenide (CIGS) grew at a 60% annual rate and it is estimated that the global CIGS market will grow to $7.6 billion by 2016.

CIGS solar cells are one of the most promising material systems for thin-film PV because of their proven efficiency advantages over other thin film materials such as cadmium telluride and amorphous silicon. Because of extreme competition and... read more

Distributed energy (DE) systems have begun to make a significant impact on energy supply and will certainly affect energy needs in the future. These systems include, but are not limited to, photovoltaics (PV), wind turbines, micro-turbines, fuel cells, and internal combustion (IC) engines.  Beyond these generation systems, energy storage and electric vehicles are expected to have an increasing impact. The PV-inverter market alone totaled $7.2 billion in 2011 and is expected... read more

Manufacturers of semiconductor devices in the microelectronic and photovoltaic industries have long been plagued by the costs of wafer fabrication. Currently, process steps such as phosphorous diffusion, aluminum alloying, coating deposition, hydrogen passivation and contact formation must be completed at extremely high temperatures. In addition to the substantial cost of heating the system, high process temperatures can introduce impurities and reduce the overall quality of a device. ... read more

Solar power generating capacity has grown from 83 MW in 2003 to over 7,200 MW in 2012, in the U.S. alone. As the solar industry grows, there is a significant need for quality control and testing methodologies. Both testing and quality control of photovoltaics (PV) and power electronics are essential to innovation and efficient production. Accurately testing new materials and manufacturing techniques in a quick and simple way can lead to unique insights and reduced manufacturing costs and... read more

Producing hydrogen from clean sources of energy has been one of the major challenges of hydrogen production. While production from fossil fuel processes has been the norm, one of the most promising clean technologies has been hydrogen production through photo-electrochemical (PEC) cells. The three main hurdles of PEC hydrogen production have been efficiency, durability, and cost of production. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) reports that for photo-electrochemical water splitting to be... read more

For years, scientists have sought to harness energy from the sun, using lenses and mirrors to focus and track sunlight, or photovoltaic cells to absorb and convert sunlight to electricity. Their goal is for solar energy to reach “grid parity”—that is, for its cost to become comparable to that of more traditional sources of energy like coal, oil, natural gas and nuclear power. Thus far, however, converting sunlight into electric power has proved to be prohibitively expensive.

Argonne has developed a new method for applying thin film coatings of transparent conducting oxides (TCOs) to large panel displays and photovoltaic (PV) cells.

IB-3094

Berkeley Lab scientists Alex Zettl and William Regan have developed a straightforward technology that enables fabrication of high efficiency, single junction photovoltaic (PV) cells from inexpensive, abundant, and nontoxic materials—notably metal oxides and sulfides. Berkeley Lab’s field-effect p-n junction lowers manufacturing costs and increases the efficiencies of PV cells and other electronic devices without the need for costly chemical doping... read more

Ames Laboratory researchers have developed fabrication methods for a polarized thermal emitter than can be used to create more efficient thermophotovoltaic devices for power generation.

In an effort to help build a sufficient supply of clean energy, scientists from Argonne National Laboratory have developed a method to create improved hybrid solar cells through the ultraviolet polymerization of a polymer precursor.

Antireflective (AR) coatings on solar cells increase the efficiency of the cells by suppressing reflection, which allows more photons to enter a silicon (Si) wafer and increases the flow of electricity. Traditional AR coatings however, add significant cost to the solar cell manufacturing process. NREL scientists have devised a method and created a nanostructured Si wafer, or black Si, which eliminates the need for a traditional AR coating while achieving comparable or higher solar cell... read more

Innovative microstructures that can direct light in a manner similar to the way semiconductors can influence electrons can be produced by creating what is termed a photonic band gap. These microstructures have the potential to change the way optoelectronic devices, such as photodiodes, LEDs, and integrated optical circuit elements, are designed and used. Ames Laboratory researchers have developed a method for creating photonic band gap materials that is economical and does not require the... read more

A reliable syntheses of semiconductor-metal heterostructure has been developed to enable application of materials in catalytic, magnetic, and opto-electronic devices, and Iowa State University, The Ames Laboratory's Contractor, is looking for industry partners to commercialize this technology.

The first generation of solar cells, used in 90% of today's cells, have a focus of high efficiency. These cells use a single p-n junction to extract energy from photons, and are manufactured from silicon semiconductors. This allows for about 30% efficiency, but resulted in a price too high to compete with fossil fuels (payback time of about 5-7 years). The second generation of solar cells focuses on low production costs using thin film cells, which resulted in much lower efficiency rates.... read more

Indium Tin Oxide, the most widely used commercial transparent conducting coating, has severe limitations such inflexibility, high processing temperatures for fabrication, increasing cost of raw materials and breakability.


 

Scientists at Idaho National Laboratory have invented a new method of producing quantum particles of varying dimensions by employing supercritical fluid process. The process exposes a single source precursor to a supercritical fluid, such as carbon dioxide, scientists developed a process to form nanoparticles for use in semi-conductor devices.

Thin-film solar cells are expected to replace the current first generation of solar photovoltaic technology due to their lower manufacturing cost and increased electrical output. Nanocrystal cells, one of the second generation of solar photovoltaics, offer the advantage of tunable optical and electrical properties, allowing manufacturers to optimize the cell’s power output. Although these cells offer many advantages, current forms of the technology must be annealed in order to increase... read more

Solar panels are designed as a photovoltaic module. The energy producing aspect of the photovoltaic module has two primary steps. The first is a semiconducting material such as silicon that can absorb the photons from sunlight, knocking electrons from atoms to produce a flow of electricity. The next step is conversion of the electricity into direct current through an array of solar cells.

The first generation of solar cells, used in 90% of today’s cells, have a focus of high efficiency.... read more

The transportation sector currently accounts for 70% of petroleum consumption and more than a third of green house gas emissions in the US. Studies have shown that  major reductions in GHG emissions can be accomplished by transitioning to battery powered automobiles. However, the large battery systems required could be problematic due to high cost in combination with limited specific energy, safety issues, as well as limited cycle and calendar life. 

A DC-to-DC converter takes a direct... read more

Ames Laboratory researchers have developed a process for fabrication of solar cells with increased efficiency. 

At production costs less than $.80/Watt, Cadmium Telluride (CdTe) thin film technology exists as the lowest cost per watt choice for solar technology.  This characteristic is due partly to the single-phase nature of the absorber layer and the ease with which the CdTe source material can be formed into thin films required for module production.

During the 20+ years of research, NREL’s CdTe Group has directed its efforts at producing CdTe structures that allow more light to... read more

Buildings consume approximately 40% of the energy, and nearly 70% of the electricity used in the United States. Building surfaces are well suited to renewable energy production. The surface area of a typical residence is large enough to produce the electricity required to operate the building. However, in order to achieve net-zero energy use, solar thermal collectors are often required to produce hot water for domestic and space heating needs or pre-heated ventilation air.
Current problems... read more

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s 2010 International Energy Outlook, solar energy is expected to grow globally by 12.7% per year until 2035; more than any other renewable energy source. To meet this demand, the renewable energy industry must develop and manufacture photovoltaic (PV) cells that are less expensive, more reliable, and more efficient in converting solar energy into electricity.

Quantum efficiency (QE) is the standard test which indicates how... read more

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) estimates that a $1 per watt installed photovoltaic (PV) solar energy system - equivalent to 5-6¢/kilowatt hour (kWh) — would make non subsidized solar competitive with the wholesale rate of electricity, nearly everywhere in the United States.  In order to reach this goal, manufacturers in the highly competitive solar manufacturing industry have placed a greater focus on two important aspects of their processes - throughput and efficiency.... read more

Argonne National Laboratory and partner Northwestern University have invented a nanostructured photovoltaic device that allows dramatic cost savings of up to 70% compared to crystalline silicon solar cells.  Photovoltaic manufacturing is an emerging industry that promises a carbon-free, nearly limitless source of energy for our nation.  However, the high-temperature manufacturing of conventional silicon-based photovoltaics is extremely energy-intensive.  The nanostructured... read more