Reducing the thickness of silicon wafers in solar cells below 40 μm typically results in decreased performance. Using black silicon for the wafer, however, which has a textured surface structure, can improve the wafer’s absorption capabilities. Researchers in Spain and Finland demonstrated this improvement by using ultrathin black silicon wafers to create interdigitated back-contact solar cells.
Read MoreThe potential of perovskites as a photovoltaic material, both in combination with silicon and alone, is gaining steam. This CTT overviews some of the biggest advancements in this field in recent months.
Read MoreDespite the recorded benefits of co-locating solar panels and crops, the erroneous belief that photovoltaics and agriculture are an either/or situation remains a common perspective in governing bodies around the world. In the past month, two media announcements out of the Netherlands reveal how a proposed ban on solar deployments on agricultural land could severely hamper the country’s budding agrivoltaic industry.
Read MoreCadmium telluride solar cells are the second most common photovoltaic technology globally after crystalline silicon. Today’s CTT looks at recent funding initiatives and commercial expansions to accelerate the impact of this maturing technology.
Read MoreOn June 25, 2023, University of Texas at Austin professor John B. Goodenough died at the age of 100. Goodenough was known for developing the metal oxide cathodes that are still used in lithium-ion batteries today, but his innovations greatly influenced many other research areas as well. His contributions to science will continue to light up the imagination of researchers in the future.
Read MoreThe idea of harvesting solar energy in outer space and beaming it back to Earth is a science-fiction concept that in recent decades gained real-world legs. Now, the California Institute of Technology announced that an experiment through its ongoing Space Solar Power Project beamed solar energy collected in space back to Earth for the first time.
Read MoreThere are many challenges to realizing a hydrogen economy that occur all along the supply chain. One challenge—converting the carrier molecule ammonia back into hydrogen—could be solved using solid acid fuel cells. ACerS Fellow Sossina Haile first developed this type of fuel cell in the late 1990s. Today’s CTT looks at Haile’s 20-year journey with her first Ph.D. student, Calum R. I. Chisholm, to realize the potential of this technology.
Read MoreTraditionally, Australia has lagged far behind other developed countries in electric vehicle adoption. The government has now released a National Electric Vehicle Strategy to speed up adoption and support the transition to clean transportation.
Read MoreSolid-state batteries are an emerging energy storage technology that are safer than conventional lithium-ion batteries. In an open-access paper, researchers at TU Wien demonstrated a novel solid-state battery composition that may offer certain advantages over other battery technologies—oxygen-ion batteries.
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