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Abstract - Energy from sun can be considered the main Solar cells were operating with 28% electricity return. There
source of all types of energies. It can be used by various are a wide range of PV cell technologies on the market today
techniques such as making full use of sunlight to directly generate and more applications.
electricity or by using heat from the sun as a thermal energy.
Using Photovoltaic (PV) cells is common in solar energy field. The
major objective of this review study is to help anyone getting
2. Photovoltaic Generation
through solar energy field by introducing developments up to
date in the field. One can be assisted and will save time of PV cell technologies are usually classified into three
building a literature review about PV by this review that is generations, depending on the basic material used [2].
considered part of a series compares the performance of PV
technologies. In this paper, a comparison survey is included 1. Crystalline Silicon
which investigates the three generations of PV cells with the latest 2. Thin Film
characteristics. 3. Concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) and Organic
Material
Index Terms - Photovoltaic technologies, Renewable Energy ,
Solar Energy, solar cells.
2.1 First-Generation: Crystalline Silicon
1. Introduction
Silicon is a semiconductor material illustrated in suitable
Photovoltaic, also called solar cells, are electronic devices for PV applications, with energy band gap of 1.1 eV.
that convert sunlight directly into electricity. Photovoltaic Crystalline silicon is the material commonly used in the PV
power were first discovered by a French scientist Edmond industry, wafer-based C-Si PV cells and modules dominate
Becquerel in 1839. The first working solar cell was the current market. Crystalline silicon cells are classified into
successfully made by Charles fritts in 1882. It was made of three types as :
thin sheets of selenium and coated with gold. The use of solar • Mono-crystalline (Mono c-Si).
panels for generating electricity and heat seems relatively • Poly-crystalline(Poly c-Si),or multi-crystalline (mc-Si).
like new development, it has actually been widely used to • Ribbon silicon
generate power since early 1900‟s. In 1954 Bell laboratory Commercial production of C-Si modules began in 1963 when
mass produced the first crystal silicon solar cell. The bell PV sharp Corporation of Japan started producing commercial PV
converted 4% of the sun’s energy into electricity a rate that modules and installed a 242 W PV module on a light house,
was considered the cutting edge in energy technology. heir the world’s largest commercial PV installation at that time [3].
scientists Daryl M. Chapin et al made a silicon-based solar Crystalline silicon technologies accounted for about 87% of
cell with an efficiency of about 6% reported in [1]. Scientists global PV sales in 2010 [4]. The efficiency of crystalline
continued to reinvent and enhanced on the design of the silicon modules ranges from 14% to 19%.
original solar cell and were able to produce a solar cell that While a mature technology continued cost reductions through
was capable of putting 20% return electricity rate. In the late improvements in materials and manufacturing processes. if the
1900‟s as awareness grew in the science community about market continues to grow, enable a number of high-volume
the effects of global warming and the need for renewable manufacturers to emerge [5].
energy sources, scientists continued to refine the silicon PV
and by early 2000 they were able to make a solar cell with 2.1.1 Mono-Crystalline silicon
24% electricity return. In just seven years scientists were
again able to increase the electricity return of silicon solar Mono – crystalline silicon cells as shown in Fig. 1 have
cell using space age materials. By 2007, modern silicon PV the highest degree of efficiency of the three most common
technologies up to 20%.
Production: is a type of photovoltaic cell material 2.1.3 Ribbon silicon
manufactured from a single crystal silicon structure
high purity silicon rods ( ingots ) are extracted from a cast String Ribbon Si wafers are grown by a vertical sheet
then cutted into thin slices ( wafers ), which are then growth technique that is currently in multi-megawatt
processed into PV cells. Expected lifespan of these cells is Production at Evergreen Solar [8]. This technique produces
typically 25 ‐ 30 years [6]. low cost Si due to the high utilization of the Si feed stock. The
high quality of the processed String Ribbon wafers has been
previously demonstrated through high minority carrier
lifetimes following cell processing. Recent research on
processing String Ribbon cells has focused on industrial type
processing. The using of screen printing for metallization and
the relatively deep junctions necessary for firing the screen
printable inks. A few years ago, it has been recorded as high
with a percentage of 16.2% efficiency cell. However, recent
cells made with screen-printing are now approaching the 16%
level .
Fig. 5 The J -V curves of the three junctions [12] Table. 1 Efficiency recent for research of PV and CPV [13]
(a)
Organic solar cells are composed of organic or polymer
materials as shown in Fig. 11. They are inexpensive, but not
very efficient. Organic PV module efficiencies are now in the
range 4% to 5% for commercial systems and 6% to 8% in the
laboratory [30]. In addition to the low efficiency, Suppliers of
organic solar cells are moving towards full commercialization
and have announced plans to increase production to more than
1 GW [31].Organic cell production uses high speed and low
temperature roll-to-roll manufacturing processes and standard
printing technologies. As a result, organic solar cells may be
able to compete with other PV technologies in some
applications, because manufacturing costs are continuing to
decline and are expected to reach $ 0.50/W by 2020
[32].Organic cells can be applied to plastic sheets in a manner
similar to the printing and coating industries, meaning that
(b)
organic solar cells are light weight and flexible as shown in
Fig. 12, making them ideal for mobile applications and for
Fig. 10 Representative CPV system [26] fitting to a variety of uneven surfaces. This makes them
a) Trough CPV system particularly useful for portable applications, Potential uses
b) Butterfly-shaped include battery chargers for mobile phones, laptops, radios,
Flash lights, toys and almost any hand held device that uses a 2.3.4 Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSC)
battery.They can also be rolled up or folded for storage when
not In use. These properties will make organic PV modules Solar cells use photo-electrochemical solar cells, which
attractive for building-integrated applications as it will expand are based on semiconductor structures formed between a
the range of shapes and forms where PV systems can be photo - sensitized anode and an electrolyte. In a typical
applied. Another advantage is that the technology uses DSSC, the semiconductor nano crystals serve as antenna
abundant, non-toxic materials and is based on a very scalable that harvest the sunlight (photons). the dye molecule is
production process with high productivity. Novel and responsible for the charge separation (photocurrent). It is
emerging solar cell concepts in addition to the above unique in that it mimics natural photosynthesis [36]. These
mentioned third-generation technologies that relay on using cells are attractive because they use low cost materials and
quantum dots/wires, quantum wells, or super lattice are simple to manufacture, e.g, titanium dioxide covered by a
technologies [33]. These technologies are likely to be used in light absorbing pigment. However, their performance can
concentrating PV technologies where they could achieve very degrade over time with exposure to UV light and the use of a
high efficiencies by overcoming the thermodynamic liquid electrolyte can be problematic when there is a risk of
limitations of conventional (crystalline) cells. The novel freezing.
concepts, often incorporating enabling technologies such as 3. Black silicon solar cell
nanotechnology, which aim to modify the active layer to
better match the solar spectrum [34]. New nanostructured silicon solar cells coated with a
passivating film as shown in Fig. 13, The nanostructuring of
silicon surfaces is a promising approach to eliminate front-
surface reflection in photovoltaic devices without the need for
a conventional antireflection coating. This might lead to both
an increase in efficiency and a reduction in the manufacturing
costs of solar cells. However, all previous attempts to integrate
black silicon into solar cells have resulted in cell efficiencies
well below 20% due to the increased charge carrier
recombination at the nanostructured surface. Here, we show
that a conformal alumina film can solve the issue of surface
recombination in black silicon solar cells by providing
excellent chemical and electrical passivation. We demonstrate
that efficiencies above 22% can be reached, even in thick
interdigitated back-contacted cells, where carrier transport is
very sensitive to front surface passivation. This means that the
surface recombination issue has truly been solved and black
silicon solar cells have real potential for industrial production.
Furthermore, we show that the use of black silicon can result
in a 3% increase in daily energy production when compared
with a reference cell with the same efficiency, due to its better
Fig. 11 Organic PV construction [35]
angular acceptance [37].