Multijunction Photovoltaic Technologies for High-Performance Concentrators: Preprint

Conference · Mon May 01 04:00:00 EDT 2006

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1109/WCPEC.2006.279560· OSTI ID:891464

McConnell, R; Symko-Davies, M

Multijunction solar cells provide high-performance technology pathways leading to potentially low-cost electricity generated from concentrated sunlight. The National Center for Photovoltaics at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory has funded different III-V multijunction solar cell technologies and various solar concentration approaches. Within this group of projects, III-V solar cell efficiencies of 41% are close at hand and will likely be reported in these conference proceedings. Companies with well-developed solar concentrator structures foresee installed system costs of $3/watt--half of today's costs--within the next 2 to 5 years as these high-efficiency photovoltaic technologies are incorporated into their concentrator photovoltaic systems. These technology improvements are timely as new large-scale multi-megawatt markets, appropriate for high performance PV concentrators, open around the world.

• Research Organization: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO.
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE
• DOE Contract Number: AC36-99GO10337
• OSTI ID: 891464
• Report Number(s): NREL/CP-520-39791
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

14 SOLAR ENERGY
36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
42 ENGINEERING
CONCENTRATORS
ELECTRICITY
ENERGY CONVERSION
HIGH-PERFORMANCE CONCENTRATOR
LARGE-SCALE
LOW-COST ELECTRICITY
MULTI-MEGAWATT
MULTIJUNCTION
NATIONAL RENEWABLE ENERGY LABORATORY
PERFORMANCE
PV
SOLAR CELLS
SOLAR CONCENTRATORS
Solar Energy - Photovoltaics