Technology and R&D

Scientists have developed a novel method to identify which hills of coal waste are suitable for the construction of a solar plant. Their technique integrates GIS and the technique for order preference by similarity to an ideal solution. They tested the new approach suburban areas of Yangquan City, China.

An international team of researchers has demonstrated a novel solvent process for pure and highly crystalline 2D perovskites, which they demonstrated in 2D/3D perovskite solar cells. A n-i-p champion perovskite solar cell had a power conversion efficiency of 25.9%, retaining 91% of the initial performance after 1,074 hours at 85 C using maximum power point tracking.

Nuclear Power Corp. of India Ltd. (NPCIL) has approached Ciel & Terre to install a floating solar plant on a sea water dyke at the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant in Tamil Nadu, India.

New research from Spain has sought to understand if dimethyl ether and ternary mixtures of carbon dioxide, dimethyl ether and butane could represent an alternative to propane in heat pump systems. Their analysis has shown dimethyl ether could be the best alternative to R290, as it offers the highest coefficient of performance values for both cooling and heating, and avoids issues related to temperature glide.

Using Google Earth imagery and 2019-2022 Sentinel-2 datasets, Chinese scientists have developed a two-stage classification framework to obtain the annual global dataset of solar photovoltaic panels at 20-meter resolution from 2019 to 2022.

Biwatt has unveiled a 155 kWh sodium-ion battery energy storage system (BESS) for commercial and industrial (C&I) customers.

Qcells says its perovskite/silicon tandem solar modules have passed several independently verified stress tests. The South Korean module maker claims the results meet benchmarks for commercial acceptance of its tandem tech.

Scientists have developed a precursor formulation for different PV simulation tools that can help calculate the expected performance of solar farms deployed on hilly slopes. Validation tests against an experimental setup showed an error of less than 3%.

Researchers in Sweden and Italy analyzed the economics of one-axis, vertical, and elevated PV systems for agrivoltaic applications, finding that overhead agrivoltaic systems may perform better the further south they are installed. The discounted payback period and levelized cost of electricity were also calculated and compared.

Three year old Space Solar has completed an 18-month engineering design and development project for key parts of its modular space-based solar power system.