Solar Technology & PV R&D News

The research team from Austria has developed an innovative gravity-based energy storage plant suitable for low energy demand locations. The solution is compatible with different storage systems including renewables.

Chengdu R&D Center of Hanergy has established a new conversion efficiency record for silicon heterojunction cells.

A Dutch-Singaporean scientific team has invented a brand-new semiconductor material based on bulk perovskite. This novel material allows collecting hot carriers’ excessive energy. Theoretically, reaping hot carriers can double hybrid-perovskite photovoltaic cells efficiency.

The Carl Zeiss Foundation has invested €4.5m in the R&D project by the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany. The KIT research team is going to invent whole new photovoltaic cells, which are supposed to provide all the benefits of organic, crystalline silicon and perovskite solar cells, such as printability, stability and ferroelectric properties.

An Egyptian scientist has discovered a new way to achieve optimal electricity generation by hybrid generators with the help of power point tracking. The newly created permanent magnetic synchronous generator for wind-solar is based on multi-input rectifier converters. It is supposed to get rid of harmonic currents with no need for additional input filtering.

The newly created photovoltaic cell is based on p-type transparent conductive film manufactured of carbon nanotubes. The innovation is announced to provide efficiency 16 per cent over the existing amorphous cells

Researchers at Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah University of Science and Technology have demonstrated a method they say could improve the stability of perovskite structures. The group found adding an organic dopant served to increase the strength of chemical bonds between organic and inorganic elements of a perovskite.

Scientists at Swedish Lund University are exploring the process due to which about a third of Fe-based solar cells’ energy is wasted. Identifying the way charge loss happens, they insist, is going to be the initial move toward solving the problem and creating high-efficiency photovoltaic cells of cheap and available material.

Scientists led by Moscow’s Skolkovo Institute of Technology have drawn upon several of their recent battery material innovations to create a potassium-ion device. The institute says its development will pave the way for ultrafast and durable, high capacity metal-ion batteries, to supply rising demand for energy storage innovations.

Research team from a few German institutes, together with South-China-based University of Technology, breaks a conversion efficiency record for organic photovoltaic modules. The 26 sq cm module consisting of 12 cells shows 12.6 per cent efficiency. The achievement is registered by Fraunhofer ISE.

The American subsidiary of Hanergy Holding has set up a new efficiency record for large-scale thin-film PV module. The recorded figure is 18.64 per cent on a unit with a 1.08 sq m opening. The achievement has been registered by German Fraunhofer ISE.

The researchers from Spain have developed a material claimed to provide radiative cooling as well as self-purification of e-devices which are subject to critical heating when operating, such as photovoltaic cells. The heat emitter allows decreasing the day-hours temp of the silicon substrate by about 14 degrees C.

Researchers have made a finding they say could vastly simplify and reduce the production cost of perovskite solar cells. Working with mixed halide perovskites, the group found a disordered chemical composition can improve device efficiency.

Parent company FlixMobility plans to test hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in Europe.

A U.S. research group has developed a metal-carbon-nanotube composite – MetZilla – which can be embedded in commercial, screen-printable silver pastes and is said to reduce the formation of hotspots in solar modules and to prolong panel lifespan. The composite metal contacts are also ‘self-healing’ as they are able to regain electrical continuity after cycles of complete electrical failure caused by extreme strain.