Modules & Upstream Manufacturing

Japan’s Kopel has developed a device with a thickness of just 1.2 mm, with contacts on all of the finger electrodes of busbar-less solar cells.

Global solar supply chain issues and the Chinese energy crisis, which hit in the second half of last year, have ironically led to a “massive” oversupply of solar panels in Australia, according to major distributors. The tension between higher global panel costs and the glut of them within Australia has led to some messy pricing and strange market dynamics on the ground.

Scientists in Germany and Switzerland have developed a perovskite solar cell with a carbon electrode that achieved 18.5% efficiency. It also retained 82% of this after 500 hours of continuous illumination. While a long way behind what has been achieved with other perovskite solar devices, the cell is produced via all low-temperature processes that could likely be scaled into low-cost, large-scale manufacturing – making the approach one worth pursuing further.

US-based CubicPV will supply 1 GW of Direct Wafer silicon solar cells per year to Indian manufacturer Waaree Energies under a five-year contract. The cells will be supplied from its upcoming 2 GW factory in India.

France’s environmental agency Ademe has released a set of new guidelines that clearly define “agrivoltaics.”

Solar might be more efficient than nuclear energy to supply power for a six-person extended mission to Mars that will involve a 480-day stay on the planet’s surface before returning to Earth, according to new US research.

The latest update to the Solar Energy Industries Association’s (SEIA) survey for solar workers and companies shows drastic outcomes for the industry if tariffs are imposed on countries under investigation.

The device is described as a heat engine with no moving parts that is able to produce power from a heat source of between 1,900 to 2,400 C. This concept is known as thermal energy grid storage (TEGS) and consists of a low-cost, grid-scale storage technology that uses thermophotovoltaic cells to convert heat to electricity above 2,000 C.

The proposed system architecture is claimed to offer more stability compared to conventional floating structures and reduces by up to 93% the contact area of the system with the water. The first system prototype was recently developed on a water reservoir in Alava, in the northeastern territory of the Basque Country.

The German company’s decision to cede market share to Chinese companies producing the material for solar panels, in order to focus on semiconductor-ready, electronic grade product, has seen it slip behind its rivals in terms of production scale.