The race for energy efficiency in solar panel technology has reached a crucial point on its path to optimization and greater ability to convert sunlight into electricity. A new study in solar cells has reached theoretical limits beyond the expectations of scientists and the energy industry to replicate it in a commercial-scale photovoltaic cell.
What new limits have been reached (or simply broken) with this new solar panel?
Conventional photovoltaic structures composed of single-junction silicon layers have offered their full collection capacity to date, exceeding up to 27% conversion of sunlight to electricity.
However, scientists at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) University have developed a novel double-layer photovoltaic cell that maximizes its ability to capture the sun’s rays, reaching an efficiency limit of 30.9% in a solar panel.
This milestone for the development of a more efficient solar panel opens up greater opportunities on a commercial scale for higher electricity capacity and savings on electricity bills, with a renewable and sustainable technology.
What are the components of this new photovoltaic cell? Goodbye to solar panels as you know them
The EPFL research team succeeded in optimizing the traditional solar panel cell with the combination of another particular element and modified the way they interact from a simple structure to a tandem way of working.
In this context, they created a solar panel with two faces, a lower one of crystalline silicon with the ability to attract infrared rays and an upper one of perovskite with a higher ability to attract high-energy photons due to having a narrower forbidden broadband.
The top layer is treated with 2,3,4,5,6-pentafluorobenzylphosphonic acid (yes, it is impossible to repeat it quickly) which offers higher solar panel efficiency and lead treatment. It is then combined with a SiO2 nanoparticle coated substrate that optimizes cell conversion.
Additionally, the top side of the perovskite solar panel uses a mixture of indium tin oxide, silicon dioxide nanoparticles, perovskite, buckminsterfullerene, phosphonic acid, silver, and zinc indium oxide.
All these components were intelligently selected and combined to offer higher absorption and electrical energy conversion efficiency. The results of the first experiments were convincing, reaching 30.9% efficiency.
Modifications made to obtain greater effectiveness: scientists have achieve the impossible
One of the technologies implemented during the experimentation was the inclusion of perovskite on the upper face to achieve greater infrared light capture and replace the gold layer that covers traditional electrodes with metal oxides.
This substitution by another type of electrical conductors allowed to obtain greater light capture, achieving a total absorption of 80% of light energy in the solar panel.
Additionally, adjustments were made to the forbidden band of the lower layer of the solar panel to maintain the traditional shape and reduce production costs when produced on a commercial scale.
In this way it was possible to optimize the technology of the traditional single junction solar panel that converted only a part of the energy into electricity by a two-sided tandem cell with the use of two minerals each with its advantages of abstraction and conversion.
The applied technology managed to overcome the 27% of the commercial solar panel by a more competitive figure exceeding 30 and achieving considerable storage stability, which offers greater effectiveness of optimizing the entire solar spectrum and saves energy.
With this innovation, it is expected that this new solar panel will begin to be produced on larger scales for solar panel structures capable of converting more energy into electricity, lowering the cost of electricity bills and allowing a massive arrival to make the transition to more sustainable energy more effective.
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