Next Generation Industrial Bifacial Silicon Solar Cells
- $1.97m Funded by ARENA
- $5.7m Total project cost
Summary
The Next Generation Industrial Bifacial Silicon Solar Cells project brings together a consortium of ANU, GCL Technology Systems (China), and Wavelabs (Germany) to represent a complete spectrum in the PV industry encompassing R&D, manufacturing and device characterisation technologies.
ANU as the project leader will be the hub of the collaboration between the groups, where fundamental studies, process innovation, technology demonstration and knowledge sharing activities are performed. Developed technologies at ANU will be transferred to industrial scale devices at GCL’s pilot factory, and new testing methodologies specifically related to bifacial cells will be developed and tested in collaboration with Wavelabs engineers.
Key results
- This project developed and applied multiple advanced fabrication technologies including laser doping, tunnel-oxide-polysilicon, and Oxide-Nitride-Oxide multi- functional film.
- The development of these technologies led to a successful demonstration of a record efficiency achieved using ‘laser doping’ technology on a 24.3% bifacial device with 96.3% bifacial factor.
- Industry collaboration led towards the development and advancement of polysilicon contact-based bifacial solar cells.
Learn more
Next Generation Industrial Bifacial Silicon Solar Cells Final Report
This is the final report for the ANU’s Next Generation Industrial Bifacial Silicon Solar Cell project.
Project innovation
Bifacial solar cell absorbs light from both front and rear surface of the device, capturing albedo light reflected off the ground and roof surfaces that would otherwise be lost. This technology has demonstrated up to 30% increase in annual energy output, representing among the biggest leap in performance for any evolutionary technology for silicon PV modules. ANU will work with industry partners GCL Technology Systems and Wavelabs to develop and integrate advanced laboratory scale technologies such as passivated contacts, and laser contact technologies into industrial scale bifacial solar cells.
Benefit
The proposed technology roadmap in this Next Generation Industrial Bifacial Silicon Solar Cells project aims to achieve 23.5% efficient laboratory cell, and 22.5% large area industry cells with over 95% bifaciality, representing a significant improvement over currently available bifacial PV modules.
