Research

A Chinese-Swiss research group has fabricated a 2D-3D perovskite solar cell with a world-record power conversion efficiency. The cell uses a 2D perovskite layer at the interface between the perovskite and the hole transport layer, which the researchers said can improve charge-carrier transport/extraction while suppressing ion migration.

Researchers in Denmark have analyzed the potential of PV systems and their influence on the underlying farmland in three different agrivoltaic projects, including vertical bifacial optimal tilted, horizontal single-axis tracking, and vertical bifacial setups. They also calculated the potential for agrivoltaic in every region in the European Union and found that the eligible areas are unevenly distributed.

An international research team has fabricated a heat-driven thermoacoustic heat pump prototype that is claimed to achieve a heating capacity of 5.7 kW and a coefficient of performance of 1.4, with a heating temperature of 300 C and a heat-sink temperature of 55 C. The device uses medium/low-grade heat sources and is purportedly able to offer a complementary solution to the existing domestic heating methods.

Scientists in China have proposed to use recycled silicon from discarded solar cells to build anodes for batteries. They combined the recycled waste silicon powder with graphite and created a composite material that is claimed to exhibit remarkable electrochemical performance.

A California hydrogen developer and a Netherlands-based desalination company have formed a new partnership.

Scientists in South Korea have stressed the importance of accurately setting the angle of slat PV blinds to maximize power generation. They found that there is a tradeoff between elevated power yield and self-shading effects in this BIPV technology.

Researchers at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) have demonstrated the use of sugar water to improve the performance of flow batteries for grid-scale energy storage.

Qatari researchers have looked at the degree to which cleaning robots reduce PV plants’ yield with the shade they produce on the panels. They found that module orientation has an enormous effect on the impact of shadow.

Researchers in Spain assembled an experimental solar simulator for vehicle-integrated and curved solar panels. They found that the measurements of the short-circuit current of the cells followed the ideal cosine response of the curvature with differences lower than 0.5%.

German scientists have fabricated a carbon electrode perovskite solar cell with a hole-transporting bilayer made of organic semiconductors instead of a conventional hole transport layer. They claim this approach improves the device’s fill factor and open-circuit voltage.