Modules & Upstream Manufacturing

While the independent investigation of a payment handed over to a state-owned lead contractor for a polysilicon fab planned by GCL exposed a breach of internal policy, the manufacturer has been cleared of any non-compliance with legal requirements.

Scientists in China examined some of the key achievements in the development of perovskite solar cells in 2020 and 2021. The group finds that translating laboratory achievements onto larger, manufacturable devices, is the biggest challenge, and sees continuing collaboration between the industry and academic researchers as the key to overcoming this challenge.

The factory will be located in the state of Ceará and is expected to begin manufacturing activities in 2022.

State-owned China Xinhua Power Development has booked a $53 million discount on seven solar farms as developer Kongsun seeks to pay down debts, and Canadian Solar has landed a 45 MWh energy storage contract in Colombia.

An international team of scientists developed a technique to isolate individual sources of electrical ‘noise’ within a solar cell. Comparing the technique to being able to pick out a single voice within a 200-person choir, they say the technique will help to improve understanding of where efficiency losses occur within a cell, and effective ways to mitigate them.

The result was confirmed by Germany’s Institute for Solar Energy Research in Hamelin.

The solar cell was fabricated with a special polymer that is able to passivate defects at the grain boundaries and interfacial surfaces, inhibit nonradiative recombination and charge-transport loss, and improve stabilities under moisture. The device exhibited a remarkable fill factor, of 0.862.

A group of international scientists has compared the hypothetical performance of three novel shapes of solar modules – pyramidal, hexagonal and conical – and has found the latter has the strongest potential in terms of thermal behavior. According to their findings, a cooling technique based on forced airflow is key to making these solar module shapes into a feasible solution.

The Chinese solar glass maker, which claimed a positive legal judgement in the European General Court in 2019, is now likely to have that victory set aside by the European Court of Justice, with an advocate-general saying the company benefited from an income tax regime which may have unfairly distorted its operations.

The PV module relies on Jinko’s TOPCon mono cell technology, for which a record efficiency of 25.25% was announced in late May. TÜV Rheinland has confirmed the result.