This work, funded through the Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis, sheds light on the chemical structure and dynamics in
photovoltaic materials, and could lead to improved designs that maximize solar energy conversion.
Proving that
photovoltaic materials need not always be part of large, bulky solar panels, Sheila Kennedy, principal architect at Kennedy & Violich Architecture and a lecturer at MIT, has developed solar textiles — membrane - like surfaces that can be draped like curtains or used to cover walls or roofs — using 3D modeling software.
This applies especially to mass - produced
photovoltaic materials.
I am saying that like it or not, for better or worse, ultra-cheap ultra-efficient
photovoltaic materials are already plentiful and readily available all over the world, and there is every reason to expect that trend to continue, with the technology becoming rapidly more powerful and less expensive and easier to produce.
Using time - resolved low frequency spectroscopy in the terahertz spectral region, the researchers explored the photo - excitations of a new class of
photovoltaic materials known as organometal halide perovskites.
(CSER) which has a world - class reputation for researching novel
photovoltaic materials and devices and which is also home to the Welsh Solar Car team.
The research also suggests graphene could be a very effective material for collecting solar energy, Jarillo - Herrero says, because it responds to a broad range of wavelengths; typical
photovoltaic materials are limited to specific frequencies, or colors, of light.
Dr. Ager's research interests include the fundamental electronic and transport characteristics of
photovoltaic materials, development of new photoanodes and photocathodes based on abundant elements for solar fuels production, and the development of new oxide - and sulfide - based transparent conductors.
«New technique allows rapid screening for new types of solar cells: Approach could bypass the time - consuming steps currently needed to test new
photovoltaic materials..»
«MX2 semiconductors have extremely strong optical absorption properties and compared with organic
photovoltaic materials, have a crystalline structure and better electrical transport properties,» Wang says.
Germanium has some desirable characteristics for
photovoltaic materials, but unfortunately it doesn't absorb light well.»
Since you're concentrating solar rays, you need only a fraction of the [expensive]
photovoltaic materials that would be required for flat panels.
Both layers were then placed on a solar cell made of perovskite, another promising
photovoltaic material.
«For
a photovoltaic material, obviously absorbing light is the first part and converting that solar energy into electrical energy is the second part,» said Ames Laboratory scientist Emily Smith.
Tiny hollow spheres of
photovoltaic material trap and loop light the same way a whispering gallery does to sound, letting solar cells absorb more light.
The compound is cheaper to use for
photovoltaic material than silicon.
This highly - efficient
photovoltaic material launched the solar industry and a period of endless opportunity and innovation.
The system needs 25 to 85 percent less silicon than a crystalline silicon panel of comparable wattage, Lewandowski says, because
the photovoltaic material need not cover the entire surface of a solar panel.
CZTS has been known since 1967 and was found suitable for
photovoltaic material in 1998.
Not exact matches
«It may actually do well in overseas markets where solar -
photovoltaic is cheap, and homeowners are used to paying a premium for building
materials and cars — such as Australia,» Bromley said in an email, according to a Bloomberg report.
From both global semiconductor and solar
photovoltaic manufacturing equipment maker Applied
Materials, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMAT) and the largest networking company in the world, Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO), Wall Street analysts are looking for marginal bottom - line growth, compared to a year ago.
Meyer Burger Technology AG (OTC: MYBUF) is a Swiss solar company that mainly focuses on
photovoltaics but also has exposure to the semiconductor and optoelectronic industries and high - end markets based on semiconductor
materials.
That includes investments in better
materials for
photovoltaic cells and alternative fuels.
These human - made
materials were introduced in the 1990s, and researchers around the world are working on ways to use them as molecular sponges for applications such as hydrogen storage, carbon sequestration, or
photovoltaics.
He was optimistic that nanotechnology — controlling matter on the molecular scale — would soon give physicists unprecedented control over the semiconductor
materials used in
photovoltaic cells.
James Mitchell Crow's article about thermoelectric solar panels mentioned that
photovoltaic (PV)
materials respond to only a narrow spectrum of...
«Our hope is that this could be used not only for perovskite nanocrystals but also for bulk
materials and thin films used in applications such as
photovoltaics.»
The trouble, from an electric utility's perspective, is the tens of thousands of Arizona's total of three million or so homes that have installed small solar:
photovoltaic panels made from wafers of semiconducting
material, typically silicon, that use incoming sunlight to create an electric current.
And the world's largest producer of
photovoltaic cells — Suntech — imports raw
materials from U.S. suppliers and manufactures its high - technology product in China.
«Currently, we are very reliant on Solar
Photovoltaic for our solar panels, but we do not have a large supply of the
materials used, so using it won't be sustainable over a long period,» explains Dr Khan.
Titanium dioxide (TiO2) is one of the most promising
materials for
photovoltaics and photocatalysis nowadays.
Their research was funded by the BMBF (Federal Ministry of Education and Research) within the scope of the POPUP project which is aimed at developing novel
materials and device structures suitable for competitive mass production processes and applications in the field of organic
photovoltaics.
Another potential use for this
material, besides
photovoltaics, is that in microscopy or imaging, researchers often need to «label» a protein or other feature with a nanoparticle «probe» to make it light up so it is easier to see and study.
In a thermo -
photovoltaic device, external heat causes the
material to glow, emitting light that is converted into an electric current by an absorbing
photovoltaic element.
In a thermo -
photovoltaic device, heat from an external source (chemical, solar, etc.) makes a
material glow, causing it to emit light that is converted into electricity by a
photovoltaic absorber.
The goal is to provide the
materials that will allow organic
photovoltaic cells to turn more than 10 % of the solar energy that hits them into electricity, compared with about 9 % for the best
materials today.
Organic
photovoltaic cells — a type of solar cell that uses polymeric
materials to capture sunlight — show tremendous promise as energy conversion devices, thanks to key attributes such as flexibility and low - cost production.
«Organic
photovoltaic cells of the future: Using charge formation efficiency to screen
materials for future devices.»
A team of
materials chemists, polymer scientists, device physicists and others at the University of Massachusetts Amherst today report a breakthrough technique for controlling molecular assembly of nanoparticles over multiple length scales that should allow faster, cheaper, more ecologically friendly manufacture of organic
photovoltaics and other electronic devices.
The team's work will enable the high - throughput screening of organic
materials for new organic
photovoltaic devices.
But in the case of
photovoltaic (PV)
materials, Kurchin explains, it is actually the minority carriers — those that are far less abundant in the
material — that are the limiting factor in a device's overall efficiency, and those are much more difficult to measure.
Researchers develop method to screen organic
materials for organic
photovoltaic cells by charge formation efficiency.
The spontaneous conversion of excitons (bound electron - hole pairs) to free carriers via these layer - edge states appears to be the key to improving the
photovoltaic and light - emitting thin - film layered
materials.
«The efficiency of devices such as
photovoltaics and LEDs depends on how well excitons move within the
material,» he adds.
«Scientists discover
material ideal for smart
photovoltaic windows: Researchers make thermochromic windows with perovskite solar cell.»
What is more, the
material is inexpensive and easy to process, promising a great future for
photovoltaics.
Such a
material — a
photovoltaic glass that is also reversibly thermochromic — is a green technology researchers have long worked toward, and now, scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have demonstrated a way to make it work.
Materials with specific properties at the nano - and micro-scale level are heavily sought after due to the broad spectrum of applications in electronics,
photovoltaics and biomimetic
material synthesis.
The
material picks up infrared and ultraviolet light and channels it to the edges, where
photovoltaic cells convert the light to electricity.
Utilizes advanced electron microscopy techniques to study nanoscale structure and defects that determine the utility of functional
materials, such as superconductors, multiferroics, and other energy related systems including thermoelectrics,
photovoltaics, and batteries.