Saturday, July 4, 2009

  Most efficient single junction solar cell-QuantaSol sets world record

  LONDON, UK-- Quantasol Ltd has developed in just two years a single-junction cell achieving 28.3% efficiency at greater than 500 suns-setting the world record for the most efficient single junction solar cell.

    Photo:Quantasol has come up with a new solar cell design that can be tuned to the light at a particular latitude, and in the process broken a 21-year-old efficiency record for one type of solar cell.
 (enlarge photo)

   Its cell had been independently assessed by solar research body Fraunhofer ISE and was found to deliver a 28.3 per cent efficiency at a solar concentration of greater than 500 suns.

    A new generation of 'nano-structured' millimetre-sized solar cells that could convert the sun's energy to electricity more than twice as efficiently as current technology,can be tuned to the prevailing light conditions of a particular place, to get the most out of the cells wherever they are.   
  
   The new scientific invention is the subject of an Imperial College London exhibit called 'A Quantum of Sol' at the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition 2009.   

   “Our technology is the industry’s best kept secret. This is the first time that anyone has successfully combined high efficiency with ease of manufacture, historically a bug-bear of the solar cell industry,” said Kevin Arthur, QuantaSol’s CEO. “We’re now gearing up to provide multi-junction cells of even higher efficiencies as early as Q1 2010.”

   The 'Quantum of Sol' exhibit explains the technology behind so-called 'third generation' solar cells. These are designed on the nano-scale, which means the materials they are made of are custom-built on a scale 1000 times smaller than the size of a human hair.

    These third generation solar cells can capture more of the sun's energy than existing silicon solar panels because they contain different layers of material that absorb a broader spectrum of colours. Individually targeting different colours of sunlight in this way captures more of the sun's energy, creating much more efficient solar cells.

   Silicon solar panels, which have been around since the 1950s and are relatively cheap to produce, lose a lot of the sun's energy, and tend to operate with just 12 - 20% efficiency.

   The new generation of so-called 'multi- junction' solar cells has the potential to perform much better, with the current world record for efficiency standing at 41%, and Dr Ekins-Daukes predicting that 50% efficiency will be achieved within a decade.

   Commercial silicon solar cells are much cheaper than GaAs, but have an efficiency of just 10 to 12 per cent and are also bulkier. The Quantasol device can cope with much brighter light without becoming overloaded, making it possible to use a very small solar cell to absorb light collected by a system of cheap lenses and mirrors.

    But more important than the peak efficiency is that the new cells can generate more electrical energy over the course of days and weeks, says Kevin Arthur, Quantasol CEO.

   "The commercial market doesn't just want high efficiency, they want the device to be optimised to the environment," he says. "In the past we measured performance in dollars per watt. Now it's cents per kilowatt-hour that's more important."

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   Saturday, July 4, 2009