Chinese and Australian scientists announced in May 2008 that they had jointly developed anatase titanium oxide decahedral single crystals with an active surface ratio of up to 47%. It is said that this high-purity anatase titanium oxide single product has important application prospects in solar cells and other fields. In addition to the shortcomings of long reaction cycle and low sample purity, the single crystal anatase titanium oxide prepared in the past has a very low active surface ratio of only 6% to 10%. The proportion is as high as 47%. The British “Nature” magazine published the latest research results in the form of Letters, and said that the results have made a breakthrough in the preparation of single crystals with a large number of highly active faces.
Photovoltaic Solar Cell Corporation (PSC) announced on June 3, 2008 the creation of dye-coated graphite-based solar cells. The solar cells are produced using special production tools that produce solar cells, or solar slats that can be used as roof tiles. The solar cells are said to be cheap, environmentally friendly, reliable, flexible, and last for a long time. Over the past 12 years, the company has used dye-coated TiO, CIGS materials, CdTe CdS materials, a-Si materials and Si-graphite compounds. Now the first dye-coated graphite-based solar cell has been created. The company has issued more than 30 patents in various photovoltaic fields.
Enerize announced in early June 2008 that it has developed a new photovoltaic module design using a proprietary transparent polymer material that can significantly outperform glass materials typically used as protective overlays. The proprietary polymer materials developed by Enerize are highly transparent and stable to exposure to UV light and ionizing radiation.
The new highly transparent polymer material can be applied directly to the surface of photovoltaic modules at low temperatures, eliminating the need for the adhesives required with glass and other polymers. This avoids multilayer structures, including reflective surfaces that are present when glass is used. Glass is not required with this polymer coating, which is available as a smooth surface or as a “wrinkle coating”. In the form of a “wrinkle coating”, the photon collection efficiency can be further improved due to the light concentrating effect of the polymer and its surface morphology.
The efficiency of PV modules is reduced by 7% or more in conventional designs using glass compared to PV modules without glass cover. A unique effect can be achieved when PV modules are coated with Enerize polymer encapsulation and protective coating materials, resulting in increased conversion efficiency compared to the same PV module without the coating. Compared to PV modules laminated with glass, PV modules coated with the Enerize polymer coating material showed at least a 25% increase in efficiency. For example, a PV module of the same type of solar cell coated with the Enerize polymer coating material is 21.2% efficient compared to 16.45% for a PV module with a glass laminate.
The increased efficiency is based on several important features, including better utilization of light in the shorter (UV) wavelength range of the optical harmonics, and the polymer coating has a higher resistance to light in the UV (UV) range compared to glass. transparency. This “wrinkle-coated” surface structure has a wider angle of incidence, which traps photons more efficiently. Compared to glass, the polymer’s low reflectivity and lack of internal surface interfaces reduce photon loss due to reflection. Other advantages include light weight, improved resistance to UV and ionizing radiation degradation (called photon degradation), and, at the same time, high mechanical strength. These polymer-coated PV modules are stable for extended periods of time under conditions of high and low temperature, thermal cycling, mechanical shock, and relatively high humidity.
In addition, ultra-high-efficiency solar cells can significantly improve the photoelectric conversion rate. Ultra-high-efficiency solar cells differ from conventional solar cells. Whereas conventional cells use only one type of semiconductor silicon wafer, ultra-high-efficiency cells (also called “multilayer” cells) use three layers of different semiconductor materials. Traditional silicon cells can absorb photons in most of the spectrum, but the ratio of their conversion to heat energy is higher than that of electricity, and the power generation efficiency is not high; while ultra-high-efficiency cells use three materials, which can Converting light in different parts of the spectrum into light energy is more efficient, resulting in more light energy being converted into electricity and less light energy being converted into heat.
The Japan Institute of Industrial Technology has newly developed a high-performance dye-sensitized solar cell with high power generation efficiency, good durability and low production cost. The so-called dye-sensitized solar cell refers to a battery in which dye and electrolyte are added between two transparent electrode substrates on a glass substrate or a plastic substrate. This technology can produce transparent batteries and batteries of various colors. At present, many research institutions are racing to develop the practical technology of dye-sensitized solar cells with broad prospects. However, in the past, such solar cells used rare metal nail complexes as light absorbing materials. Volatile organic solvents of iodine and iodide ion electrolytes make battery durability less than ideal. In the latest research of the Japan Institute of Industrial Technology, in order to improve the power generation efficiency and solve the above problems, the researchers developed an organic pigment light absorbing material MK-2 instead of the nail complex, and at the same time used a new electrolyte, and finally developed a photoelectric conversion Organic dye-sensitized solar cells with an efficiency of 7.6%. The raw materials for this battery are not resource-constrained and can be produced at a lower cost.
