New Thin Film Photovoltaic World Record announced on Conference in Berlin
Advanced analytics for both thin film technologies with silicon as well as CIGS: Beside highly developed deposition tools, a comprehensive infrastructure was set up at PVcomB. Here, a glass substrate is loaded into a multi-chamber deposition tool where it will be deposited with only a few micrometers of silicon layers forming finally the active part a solar cell.
Foto: Berlin Partner für Wirtschaft und Technologie / Monique Wüstenhagen
The 5th International Workshop on CIGS Solar Cell Technology organized bei Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) started with a bang. Katsumi Kushiya by the Japanese company Solar Frontier presented the approximately 100 participants a new world record conversion efficiency for thin-film-photovoltaic technologies. Their new thin-film CIGS cells can convert 20.9 percent of the incident sunlight into electrical energy beating the previous Solar Frontier- record of 19.7 percent conversion efficiency. The previous best value for all thin-film photovoltaic technologies was 20.8 percent.
Solar Frontier has achieved this in a joint research with the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO). As the company reported the new world record was achieved on a 0.5 cm2 solar CIGS cell. The CIGS layer was deposited on a glass substrate using a sputtering-selenization formation method - a similiar technology is also used by HZBs Photovoltaic Cpmpetence Centre (PVcomB) for coating its 30 by 30 cm2 modules.
Prof. Dr. Rutger Schlatmann, head of PVcomB and organizer of the workshop is pleased with the message: "Congratulations to Solar Frontier. We are happy, that they have chosen our workshop to announce this great result. This shows that the event is well established in the thin film community and has a very good reputation."
The workshop IW CIGSTech continues the previous Thin Film Week, traditionally held in April in Berlin-Adlershof. The PVcomB organise the workshop annually within its Programme "Advanced Research and Innovation in the New States" funded by the federal government and the State of Berlin.
- Joint Kyiv Energy and Climate Lab goes liveHelmholtz-Zentrum Berlin and the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy established on 27 November a Joint Energy and Climate Lab.
- How carbonates influence CO2-to-fuel conversionResearchers from the Helmholtz Zentrum Berlin (HZB) and the Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society (FHI) have uncovered how carbonate molecules affect the conversion of CO2 into valuable fuels on gold electrocatalysts. Their findings reveal key molecular mechanisms in CO2 electrocatalysis and hydrogen evolution, pointing to new strategies for improving energy efficiency and reaction selectivity.
- Peat as a sustainable precursor for fuel cell catalyst materialsIron-nitrogen-carbon catalysts have the potential to replace the more expensive platinum catalysts currently used in fuel cells. This is shown by a study conducted by researchers from the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB), Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) and universities in Tartu and Tallinn, Estonia. At BESSY II, the team observed the formation of complex microstructures within various samples. They then analysed which structural parameters were particularly important for fostering the preferred electrochemical reactions. The raw material for such catalysts is well decomposed peat.