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Harnessing the mother load of the sun’s power is almost within our grasp.
The sun, our main source of energy, bathes our Blue Planet with more solar energy than we can reasonably expect to use. Every hour, the sun sends us 430 quintillion joules of energy, more than the 410 quintillion joules that humans consume in an entire year. Given that the sun is likely to be around for another five billion years, we have a virtually limitless energy source, if only we could harness it efficiently.
Unfortunately, we can currently only tap a tiny amount of this energy due to technical limitations.
But that could be about change, thanks to advances in a wonderful crystal: perovskite.
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) of the US Department of Energy. USA (DOE) has forged a public-private consortium called US-MAP for the US Advanced Perovskite Manufacturing Consortium. USA, which aims to accelerate the development of low-cost perovskite solar cells for the global market.
Silicon panels
According to the IEA, solar power supplied just 592GW, or a mere 2.2%, of the world’s 26,571GW in electricity consumption in 2018. That was after impressive growth of 20% in global PV installations with nearly 100GW .
More than 90% of the installed photovoltaic (PV) panels were built with crystallized silicon.
Silicon panels have their advantages: they are quite robust and relatively easy to install. Thanks to advances in manufacturing methods, they have become quite inexpensive over the past decade, particularly polycrystalline panels built in Chinese factories.
However, they do have a major drawback: Silicon PV panels are quite inefficient, with the most affordable models managing only 7% -16% energy efficiency depending on factors such as location, orientation, and weather conditions. Si panels are wafer-based rather than thin-film, making them stronger and more durable, but offsetting is a sacrifice of efficiency.
To satisfy the world’s growing energy appetite, and reach the kind of decarbonisation targets that would help curb the impact of climate change, it would take hundreds of years to build and install enough silicon photovoltaic panels.
This is too slow, given that we have a mere 10-year window to act to prevent irreversible and catastrophic climate change.
More critically, the best (and most expensive) silicon panels to date boast an efficiency rating of 26.7%, very close to the theoretical maximum of 29.1%. Related: The US Platform Count USA Almost 50% falls in seven weeks of crisis
For years, scientists have experimented with alternative crystal formations that would allow panels of similar size to capture more energy. Until now, few designs have emerged that are commercially viable, particularly thin-film cells that could theoretically achieve much higher levels of efficiency.
Thin film photovoltaic panels can absorb more light and therefore produce more energy. These panels can be manufactured cheaply and quickly, meeting more energy demand in less time. There are a few different types of thin film, all slightly different from standard crystalline silicon (c-si) photovoltaic panels.
Amorphous silicon (a-Si) panels are the oldest form of thin film: chemical vapor deposits a thin layer of silicon on glass or plastic, producing a low weight panel that is not very energy efficient, handling 13.6%. Then there are the cadmium telluride (CdTe) panels, which use the cadmium particle in the glass to produce a high-efficiency panel.
The downside is cadmium metal, which is toxic and difficult to produce in large quantities.
These panels are generally produced using evaporation technology: the particles overheat and the steam is sprayed onto a hard surface, such as glass. They are thin, but not as reliable or durable as the c-si panels, which currently dominate the market.
NREL Perovskita Advance
Perovskite has now managed to break the glass ceiling of efficiency.
Perovskites are a family of crystals named after the Russian geologist Leo Perovski, “perovskites”. They share a set of characteristics that make them possible building blocks for solar cells: high superconductivity, magnetoresistance, and ferroelectricity. Perovskite thin-film photovoltaic panels can absorb light of a wider variety of wavelengths, producing more electricity from the same solar intensity.
In 2012, scientists finally managed to make thin-film perovskite solar cells, which achieved efficiencies of more than 10%. But since then, the efficiency in new perovskite cell designs has skyrocketed: Recent models can hit 20%, all from a thin film cell that (in theory) is much easier and cheaper to manufacture than a thick film silicon panel.
At Oxford University, researchers achieved 25% efficiency; A German research team has reached 21.6%, while a new record was set in December 2018, when an Oxford laboratory reached 28% efficiency.
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory NREL has been able to build a Silicon-Perovskite composite cell by placing perovskites on top of a silicon solar cell to create a multi-functional solar cell, with the new cell having an efficiency of 27% compared to just the 21% when only silicon is used. used.
But perhaps most significantly, the organization has been able to increase the longevity of Perovskite solar cells by altering their chemical composition to overcome light-induced phase segregation, a process through which the alloys that make up the solar cells are decompose when exposed to continuous light.
Low-cost perovskite panels
Solar energy has become more affordable, accessible, and prevalent than ever thanks to technology enhancements, competitive procurement, and a large base of internationally active and experienced project developers.
According to the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), solar power generation is now fully competitive with fossil fuel power plants, with a global weighted average cost of electricity (LCOE) level for utility-scale solar photovoltaic cells that has decreased by 75% to less of USD 0.10 / kWh since 2010.
Source: IRENA
However, there is still work to be done.
With an LCOE of $ 0.085 / kWh for PV cells and $ 0.185 / kWh for concentrating solar projects, solar energy (utility scale + residential roof) is still more expensive than other renewable sources, such as hydroelectric, onshore wind, geothermal and bioenergy.
Oil wells that will never recover
US-MAP plans to resolve issues primarily related to manufacturing and durability, and also address sustainability issues related primarily to the use of lead and other metals. The consortium will focus on financing from federal sources and will also explore financing from the private sector.
Hopefully, you will be able to make this IEA prediction come true by making solar energy one of the cheapest, if not the cheaper, ways to generate electricity by 2025.
The capacity weighted average is the average cost leveled by technology, weighted by the new capacity that comes online in each region. Capacity additions for each region are based on additions from 2023 to 2025. Technologies for which capacity additions are not expected do not have a capacity weighted average and are marked NB, or not built.
2O & M = operations and maintenance.
Source: EIA
By Alex Kimani for Oilichelin
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