TOPCon

The new edition of the International Technology Roadmap for Photovoltaic (ITRPV), published this week, finds that 295 GW of PV modules was shipped in 2022, and that prices for silicon PV modules fell by 7% over the year. The report finds that price premiums for n-type modules are now marginal, and the technology grew to represent 15% of the market, and is expected to keep growing over the coming decade.

China’s DAH Solar has added a specially designed microinverter to its Full-screen module, making the ‘SolarUnit’ a formidable offering for the rooftop PV segment. DAH Solar President Shenheng Xie took pv magazine through some of the system’s key features and the advantages they promise once installed.

In recent months, China’s Risen Energy has posted impressive module efficiencies, closing in on 24%, with its hyper-ion series. The company will ramp up to large-scale production of these heterojunction products in the first half of 2023, and pv magazine recently caught up with Risen Energy’s Chief Information Officer Terry Wu to discuss this, as well as the company’s work on energy storage projects.

The China Academy of Metrology and Science has certified Jolywood’s 26.7% efficiency rating for an n-type tunnel oxide passivated contact (TOPCon) solar cell, which the company claims is a world record. In November 2022, it announced a 26.1% efficiency rating for a similar cell.

Solar module prices will be pressured by rising industrial capacity this year, with capacities doubling in the ingot/wafer stages and potentially quadrupling for polysilicon by 2027, according to the latest PV pricing report from Clean Energy Associates (CEA).

Data collected from a 30 MW PV project in China’s Tianjin Province demonstrates that n-type tunnel oxide passivated contact (TOPCon) modules achieve a little more than 5% more energy yield than p-type PERC. Analysis by JinkoSolar, which supplied its TOPCon modules to the project, credits the n-type modules’ increased performance to a better temperature coefficient in the project’s hot climate, higher bifaciality and lower degradation.

Clean Energy Associates (CEA) has calculated the price premium that solar developers will swallow in return for the levelized cost of energy (LCOE) savings offered by the latest generation of high-efficiency PV panels.

The search for ever higher conversion efficiency has driven solar researchers to focus on back-contact cell approaches, and efforts to devise more cost-effective manufacturing are bringing technologies such as interdigitated back contact (IBC) solar into the mainstream, as Mark Hutchins reports.

Chinese manufacturer Beyondsun said the new panel series are relying on 182mm n-type half-cut TOPCon cells and super multi busbar (SMBB) technology. It reaches a maximum efficiency of 22.45% and its power output ranges from 415 W to 580 W.

Seraphim is offering four versions of its new SIV N-TOPCon modules, with power outputs between 565 W and 580 W. The power conversion efficiency ranges from 21.87% and 22.45%.The Chinese manufacturer said the panels can be used for distributed-generation PV projects and ground-mounted power stations.