European consortium targets 25% CIGS solar cell efficiency

The project prototypes aim to showcase higher CIGS efficiency, scale up from lab-sized bifacial devices to mini-modules, reduce raw material consumption, establish shorter manufacturing processes, and enhance module technologies.

The “High efficiency bifacial thin film chalcogenide solar cells” (Hi-BITS) initiative is a collaboration of eight research institutes and universities, plus six companies. The research institutes include International Iberian Nanotechnology Laboratory (INL), Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology (EMPA), Sweden’s Uppsala University, Germany’s Zentrum für Sonnenenergie- und Wasserstoff-Forschung (ZSW) and Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg. Other participants include France’s Centre national de la recherche scientifique and Institut Photovoltaïque d’Ile-de-France (IPVF),  the University of Luxembourg, and Spain’s Catalonia Institue for Energy Research (IREC).

The group of six companies includes Avancis, based in Germany, which recently achieved a power conversion efficiency of 20.3% in a completely encapsulated CIGS module with an integrated series connection measuring 30 cm × 30 cm, and Midsummer, based in Sweden, which is currently operating a CIGS module factory in southern Italy. Other members are Sunplugged, based in Austria, along with French building materials supplier Saint-Gobain, Berlin-based GreenDelta GmbH and Poland’s Roltec, which is a module manufacturer.