Nanotech to make solar panels more efficient

Engineers at the University of California, San Diego have demonstrated that nanoparticles can increase the efficiency with which sunlight can be converted into electricity in thin-film photovoltaics, opening new prospects for solar electricity.

The new solar energy device created by electrical engineers at UC San Diego could boost thin-film solar cell efficiency by increasing the number of photons (light carriers) that the cells absorb as well as the number of excited electrons it collects.

This is enabled by semiconductor nanowires, which have a unique geometry that allows a large surface area to volume ratio, giving photons more time to be absorbed.

The UCSD engineers are attempting to break “the theoretical limit of 31% efficiency” for conventional single junction solar cells and reach “45% sunlight-to-electricity conversion efficiencies”.

[...]

The initial findings of the UCSD project were published in February 2008 in  Nano Letters , an American Chemical Society publication reporting on research results related to the theory and practice of nanosciences. The engineers recently received $885 million (€573 million) from the US Department of Energy to carry out the research.

Vía: EuroActiv.com

Tags: Energía solar, Nanotecnologías