The Lemon Fool

A breakthrough approaches for solar power

Oxford PV, a university spin-off, says it reached 28% efficiency with a commercial perovskite-based solar cell in late 2018, and will have an annual 250-megawatt production line running this year. Both Oxford PV and Swift Solar make tandem solar cells - these are silicon panels which also have a thin perovskite film layer. Since they're made from two materials, they get to break through the Shockley-Queisser limit.

AiYn'U

AsleepInYorkshire wrote:
Oxford PV, a university spin-off, says it reached 28% efficiency with a commercial perovskite-based solar cell in late 2018, and will have an annual 250-megawatt production line running this year. Both Oxford PV and Swift Solar make tandem solar cells - these are silicon panels which also have a thin perovskite film layer. Since they're made from two materials, they get to break through the Shockley-Queisser limit.[/color]

There's another interesting technique discussed further down the article that's also achieving somewhere around the magical 30% efficiency level -

Insolight, a Swiss startup, has taken a different tack - embedding a grid of hexagonal lenses in a solar panel's protective glass, thus concentrating light 200 times. To follow the sun's motion, the cell array shifts horizontally by a few millimetres throughout the day. It is a bid to make concentrated solar cheap.

"The architecture of these conventional concentrated photovoltaics is very costly. What we've done is miniaturise the sun tracking mechanism and integrate it within the module," says Insolight's chief business officer David Schuppisser.

"We've done it in a cheaper way [that] you can deploy anywhere you can deploy a conventional solar panel," he says.

The Universidad Politécnica de Madrid's solar energy institute measured Insolight's current model as having an efficiency of 29%. It is now working on a module that is hoped to reach 32% efficiency.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-51799503

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

Itsallaguess wrote:There's another interesting technique discussed further down the article that's also achieving somewhere around the magical 30% efficiency level -

Insolight, a Swiss startup, has taken a different tack - embedding a grid of hexagonal lenses in a solar panel's protective glass, thus concentrating light 200 times. To follow the sun's motion, the cell array shifts horizontally by a few millimetres throughout the day. It is a bid to make concentrated solar cheap.

"The architecture of these conventional concentrated photovoltaics is very costly. What we've done is miniaturise the sun tracking mechanism and integrate it within the module," says Insolight's chief business officer David Schuppisser.

"We've done it in a cheaper way [that] you can deploy anywhere you can deploy a conventional solar panel," he says.

The Universidad Politécnica de Madrid's solar energy institute measured Insolight's current model as having an efficiency of 29%. It is now working on a module that is hoped to reach 32% efficiency.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-51799503

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

With all the alternatives becoming available I wonder how long it will be before we can divorce ourselves from the need for oil and leave the Middle East to continue with its democratic values

I think the missing link in all of the new technologies is "battery" efficiency and "clean" battery production

AiYn'U

Itsallaguess wrote:

AsleepInYorkshire wrote:
Oxford PV, a university spin-off, says it reached 28% efficiency with a commercial perovskite-based solar cell in late 2018, and will have an annual 250-megawatt production line running this year. Both Oxford PV and Swift Solar make tandem solar cells - these are silicon panels which also have a thin perovskite film layer. Since they're made from two materials, they get to break through the Shockley-Queisser limit.[/color]

There's another interesting technique discussed further down the article that's also achieving somewhere around the magical 30% efficiency level -

Insolight, a Swiss startup, has taken a different tack - embedding a grid of hexagonal lenses in a solar panel's protective glass, thus concentrating light 200 times. To follow the sun's motion, the cell array shifts horizontally by a few millimetres throughout the day. It is a bid to make concentrated solar cheap.

"The architecture of these conventional concentrated photovoltaics is very costly. What we've done is miniaturise the sun tracking mechanism and integrate it within the module," says Insolight's chief business officer David Schuppisser.

"We've done it in a cheaper way [that] you can deploy anywhere you can deploy a conventional solar panel," he says.

The Universidad Politécnica de Madrid's solar energy institute measured Insolight's current model as having an efficiency of 29%. It is now working on a module that is hoped to reach 32% efficiency.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-51799503

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

It's funny that this breakthrough comes from Spain, but maybe they need to concentrate on the "low hanging fruit". Electricity in Spain is more expensive for domestice users than it is here, but one striking thing in the small town (pop. 15000) where we have a house on the sunny coast in Catalonia, is the lack of solar water heaters on people's roofs. A couple of guys came round last year selling systems to do this. They hadn't noticed that we had already intalled a system on our roof that provides free hot water for about 8 months of the year and told us that there were only about two other houses in town that had them. Most people seem to have electric immersion heaters, but surely it doesn't make sense to use expensive PV panels to generate electricity which is then mostly used to heat water!
regards,
S