Solar Cells Info

Sunday | November 5, 2006
Source: Jamaica-gleaner.com
http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20061105/auto/auto6.html

The new VW samba bus is based on the classic version of the first VW Transporter from 1950, but the similarities are only skin-deep. Over 15 innovative ideas have been realised in the bus, which has been named ‘Chameleon’.

At Volkswagen’s Electronics Research Laboratory (ERL) in Palo Alto, California, you can currently take a look into the future. The packaging is a familiar face from the ’60s: the Samba-Bus. But although the bus is based on the classic version of the first VW Transporter from 1950, the similarities are only skin-deep. On the inside it features values going far into the future. America had a particular attachment to the Samba-Bus, or the ’21 Window Bus’ as it was affectionately known there. In its time it touched a whole new generation of Americans. Especially in California, it was the bus that symbolised the motorisation of young Americans, freedom and a new taste for life.
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Article by Bruce Morey
Source:  Solarforecast.com
http://www.solarforecast.com/ArticleDetails.php?articleID=322

With the on-going shortage of silicon feedstock on the minds of many in the solar PV industry, it is natural to seek an alternative to creating solar cells that use silicon based products. CIGS solar cells, sometimes referred to as CIS, are made from Copper, Indium, Gallium and Selenium and have been under development for some time. Most notably, they do not contain any silicon. If current announced plans are achieved, this technology should be able to deliver solar modules in production quantities in 2007. The steps to production have included manufacturing ramp-up and the work needed for market introduction.
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Tue Nov 14, 2006 11:33am ET30
Source: Reuter News
http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?
type=scienceNews&storyid=2006-11-14T163256Z_01_L14702690_RTRUKOC_0_US-ENERGY-SOLAR.xml&src=rss

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – A European consortium has improved the efficiency of silicon solar cells, hoping to reduce the cost of generating solar power, the Dutch energy research center ECN said on Tuesday. “Researchers increased the conversion (from sunlight to electricity) efficiency of large-area multicrystalline silicon solar cells to a record value of 18 percent,” ECN said in a statement.

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Leading German Solar Energy compnay Conergy to create 1,000 jobs at state-of-the-art solar factory in Frankfurt.

— Conergy is investing around EUR 250 million in production process
— World’s only fully integrated solar wafer, cell and module production in  former chip factory in Frankfurt
— Investment goal to secure cost and quality leadership on the global solar market

12.11.2006  Source:
http://www.presseportal.de/story.htx?nr=899538

Hamburg/Frankfurt, November 12, 2006 – Hamburg-based Conergy AG is building the world’s most technologically advanced production plant for solar modules on the site of the former chip factory in  Frankfurt. Conergy’s board of management has now given the green light for building to start. In the first stage of development, the company will invest around EUR 250 million in the world’s first and only fully integrated mass production of wafers, cells and modules. In the medium term, it will create more than 1,000 jobs on the site of the former chip factory.
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By Alan Joch
Source: Plenty magazine
http://plentymag.com/features/2006/11/sand_trap.php

High oil prices, growing interest in alternative energy, and decades of R&D all mean boom times for the solar industry, right? Not quite. Just when solar-panel sales should be skyrocketing, the industry finds itself grappling with a nagging shortage of polysilicon, the key ingredient in photovoltaic solar cells. Tight supplies are frustrating panel makers and causing investors to balk at backing public companies.

“Right now, I’d say we are in a correction phase for solar stocks,” says J. Peter Lynch, a private investment banker focused on renewable energy for alternative energy companies. “Wall Street said, ‘Jeez, these solar stocks have really run up,’ but then the light suddenly went on about the polysilicon shortage, and the stocks corrected by about 20 to 25 percent. The logic behind it is, ‘Whoops, we went too far.’”
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The global shipments of solar photovoltaic cells and modules have been growing at an average
annual rate of more than 35 percent for the past few years

By Jessie Ho, STAFF REPORTER Taipei Times
Saturday, Nov 11, 2006, Page 12

Source : Taipei Times
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/biz/archives/2006/11/11/2003335905

Delta Electronics Inc, its subsidiary DelSolar Co and Geneva-based STMicroelec-tronics NV have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) in the field of photovoltaic power generation, Delta said in a filing to the stock exchange yesterday. Under the terms of the MOU signed in Paris on Thursday, the three companies would explore ways to form a strategic partnership to increase solar cell production and develop photovoltaic inverters and power supply applications, the statement said.

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Thin-Film Startup Raises $35M

As the silicon shortage continues, investors focus on thin-film solar technologies.
October 27, 2006
source:  Redherring.com
http://www.redherring.com/Article.aspx?a=19435

Miasolé has raised $35 million in venture capital funding to begin producing its thin-film solar cells, CEO David Pearce said Friday.

The company wouldn’t disclose investors or terms of the deal, but previous investors include Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, VantagePoint Venture Partners, Firelake Strategic Technology Fund, Garage Technology Ventures, and Nippon Kouatsu Electric. The startup is using the money to expand, Mr. Pearce said. Miasolé is building a factory with the capacity to produce 50 megawatts-worth of cells annually at its offices in Santa Clara, he said. He added that the company has additional manufacturing plans, but said he wouldn’t disclose details.

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By Joanna Glasner, Nov, 06, 2006
Source: Wired.com
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,72058-0.html?tw=wn_technology_1

In a world where sun-powered garden lights seem like a nifty idea, new technologies touted by solar energy startups sound very far out. Entrepreneurs promise that soon solar-energized “power plastic” will radically extend the battery life of laptops and cell phones. Ultra-cheap printed solar cells will enable construction of huge power-generating facilities at a fraction of today’s costs. And technologies to integrate solar power-generation capability into building materials will herald a new era of energy-efficient construction.

Those are ambitious goals for a technology famous for powering pocket calculators, but investors are paying heed. This year, solar startups have snapped up more than $100 million in venture capital to develop printable materials capable of converting sunlight into electrical power. Soaring energy demand, as well as short supplies of polysilicon, a key ingredient in most solar cells, is fueling interest in alternative materials.
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Monographs on Solar Cells

Thin Film Solar Cells: Fabrication, Characterization and Applications
(Wiley Series in Materials for Electronic & Optoelectronic Applications)
by Jef Poortmans and Vladimir Arkhipov (Hardcover – Nov 3, 2006)

Stability studies of cadmium telluride/cadmium sulfide thin film solar cells
Dissertation by Bhaskar Reddy, Tetali (Paperback – Oct 31, 2006)

High performance organic solar cell architectures
Dissertation by Kanzan, Inoue (Paperback – Oct 10, 2006)

Impact of secondary barriers on copper-indium-gallium-selenide solar-cell operation
Dissertation by Alexei O., Pudov (Paperback – Oct 31, 2006)

Resonance Raman study of interfacial electron transfer in dye sensitized solar cells
Dissertation by Jennifer Ann, Pollard (Paperback – Aug 23, 2006)

Modeling optical properties of thin film copper(indium,gallium)selenide solar cells using spectroscopic ellipsometry:
(Dissertation) by Scott H. Stephens (Digital – Aug 1, 2006)

Titanium dioxide dye-sensitized polyaniline solar cells
by Hooi-Sung Kim (Paperback – Mar 20, 2006)

in-Film Crystalline Silicon Solar Cells: Physics and Technology
Device physics of copper(indium,gallium)selenide(2) thin-film solar cells
by Markus Gloeckler (Paperback – Mar 20, 2006)

High performance organic solar cell architectures:
(Dissertation) by Kanzan Inoue (Digital – April 1, 2006)

Using resonance energy transfer to improve exciton harvesting in organic-inorganic hybrid solar cells:
(Dissertation) by Yuxiang Liu (Digital – May 1, 2006)

Deep level transient spectroscopy study of indium gallium arsenic nitride grown by MBE and MOCVD for multijunction solar cells
by Siva Prasad Kotamraju (Paperback – Mar 20, 2006)

Pulsed laser annealing and rapid thermal annealing of copper-indium-gallium-diselenide-based thin film solar cells
by Xuege Wang (Paperback – Mar 17, 2006)

Understanding and development of manufacturable screen-printed contacts on high sheet-resistance emitters for low-cost silicon solar cells
by Mohamed M. Hilali (Paperback – Mar 18, 2006)

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Special Session : Materials and Modelling for High Efficiency Photovoltaics (Solar Energy & Renewables)
within the 11th WSEAS International conference on CIRCUITS, Agios Nikaloas, Crete Islands, Greece
July 23-25, 2007

Topics:

*Thin Films and Solar Cells; Fabrication and modeling
*Tunneling and thermionic effects in Solar Cells
*Auger recombination in quantum well solar cells
*Quantum well solar cells
*High efficiency concepts
*Amorphous Silicon solar cells
* Reduced dimensionality solar cells
*III-V’ and III-N-V’s in solar cells
*Conduction in Superlattices
*Quantum dots and solar cells; Transparent Conducting Oxides (TCO) in solar cells

Organizer:
Professor Argyrios Varonides,
Physics and EE Dept, University of Scranton, Scranton, PA 18510, USA
Tel 570-941-6290, Fax: 570-941-4085
E-mail address: Varonides@uofs.edu