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A special issue of Materials (ISSN 1996-1944). This special issue belongs to the section "Energy Materials".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 August 2021) | Viewed by 9011

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Prof. Dr. Lucjan Jacak

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National Laboratory for Quantum Technologies, Wrocław University of Science and Technology, 50-370 Wroclaw, Poland
Interests: solar cells; quantum dots; plasmonics; perovskite materials; topological quantum effects in condensed matter
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Dr. Witold A. Jacak

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Guest Editor

Department of Quantum Technology, Wrocław University of Science and Technology, 50-370 Wrocław, Poland
Interests: quantum nano-plasmonics; photovoltaics; metallization of solar cells; perovskite solar cells; plasmonic photovoltaic effect
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Photovoltaics is a rapidly developing domain of science and technology in view of strongly desired common sustainably energy sources of crucial importance for protection of global climate. Research towards enhancement of solar cell efficiency is one of the most important directions in modern physics and technology. New materials and a variety of construction concepts for solar batteries, including widely used Si cells, thin film cells, dye-cells and other chemical organic cells, perovskite cells, plastic cells, metalized cells and others, have potential for the optimization of future flexible and economic competitive solutions for large-scale solar plants for energetics as well as for special applications, like cosmic technology. This Special Issue of Materials entitled Materials for photovoltaic applications aims to gather a worldwide review of current attempts in science and technology toward harnessing solar energy in an optimized and effective manner suitable to potential commercial usage.

The Special Issue will cover the following issues (not exclusively):

Solar cells— conventional materials (Si, CIGS, etc.) and new ones;
Various concept of solar cells—semiconductor solar cells, chemical organic solar cells, dye solar cells, thin film and plastic solar cells;
Perovskite solar cells—efficiency and new low-cost methods of production;
Metallization of solar cells toward better efficiency;
Theory of photovoltaic effect—quantum corrections for the metallic component plasmon effect, multilayer solar cells, multicolor solar cells, and others;
Large-scale solar cell plants for global energetics—efficiency and durability;
Solar cells for special application—such as for satellites or small-scale low-cost applications in developing countries;
Study for optimization of solar cell solutions by numerical systems (like COMSOL and similar)—development of numerical tools;
Other issues related to photovoltaics.

Prof. Lucjan Jacak
Dr. Hab. Eng. Witold A. Jacak
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

solar cell green-energy
photovoltaic mechanisms and materials
new concepts for solar batteries
plasmons for photovoltaics
efficiency and durability of practical photovoltaic solutions

Published Papers (4 papers)

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9 pages, 1452 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Toward Current Matching in Tandem Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells

by Junfeng Wei, Zhipeng Shao, Bin Pan, Shuanghong Chen, Linhua Hu and Songyuan Dai

Materials 2020, 13(13), 2936; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma13132936 - 30 Jun 2020

Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1861

Abstract

The tandem pn-type dye-sensitized solar cells (pn-DSCs) have received much attention in the field of photovoltaic technologies because of their great potential to overcome the Shockley-Queisser efficiency limitation that applies to single junction photovoltaic devices. However, factors governing the short-circuit current densities (J_sc) of pn-DSC remain unclear. It is typically believed that J_sc of the pn-DSC is limited to the highest one that the two independent photoelectrodes can achieve. In this paper, however, we found that the available J_sc of pn-DSC is always determined by the larger J_sc that the photoanode can achieve but not by the smaller one in the photocathode. Such experimental findings were verified by a simplified series circuit model, which shows that a breakdown will occur on the photocathode when the photocurrent goes considerably beyond its threshold voltage, thus leading to an abrupt increase in J_sc of the circuit. The simulation results also suggest that a higher photoconversion efficiency of the pn-DSCs can be only achieved when an almost equivalent photocurrent is achieved for the two photoelectrodes. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Materials for Solar Photovoltaic Applications)

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11 pages, 4146 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Influences of Low Intensity on Diode Parameters of CdTe Solar Cells

by Xiaobo Xu, Wenping Gu, Xiaoyan Wang, Wei Zhu, Lin Zhang and Zan Zhang

Materials 2020, 13(9), 2194; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma13092194 - 10 May 2020

Viewed by 1712

Abstract

This study deals with the CdS/CdTe solar cells under low illumination intensity, with cell #1 for the shunt resistance exceeding 100,000 Ω·cm² and cell #2 for the shunt resistance above 1000 Ω·cm². The diode parameter variations with the decline of the irradiance intensity are illustrated by dividing 0–100 mW/cm⁻² into a number of small intensity ranges for J–V measurements and assuming the diode parameters to be constant within each range, the diode parameters of each range including the series resistance, the shunt resistance, the reverse saturation current density and the ideality factor are then extracted by employing an analytical approach. The mechanism of the cell performance deviations are also investigated by basic theories, reports and experiments. For cell #1 with higher R_sh corresponding to less traps, R_sh shows a upward tendency as the irradiance declines, n and J₀ exhibit a rise with the irradiance and keep nearly unchanged at the low irradiance values mainly due to recombination and carrier contributions, R_s shows a slight increase when the irradiance intensity goes down because of the resistance of CdTe absorption layer. For cell #2 with lower R_sh corresponding to more traps, with the decrease of the illumination intensity, R_sh increases sharply only for captured carrier reduction, R_s goes steadily up similarly, n and J₀ exhibit a decline with the irradiance due to recombination shift. It should be pointed out that R_s varies much smoother than the traditional approximation of a reciprocal of differential at short circuit, and the distribution of R_sh is diverse, and an average R_sh of for each intensity range can reflect the variation trend. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Materials for Solar Photovoltaic Applications)

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16 pages, 2415 KiB

Open AccessFeature PaperArticle

Application of Core–Shell Metallic Nanoparticles in Hybridized Perovskite Solar Cell—Various Channels of Plasmon Photovoltaic Effect

by Katarzyna Kluczyk-Korch, Christin David, Witold Jacak and Janusz Jacak

Materials 2019, 12(19), 3192; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma12193192 - 29 Sep 2019

Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2315

Abstract

We analyze the microscopic mechanism of the improvement of solar cell efficiency by plasmons in metallic components embedded in active optical medium of a cell. We focus on the explanation of the observed new channel of plasmon photovoltaic effect related to the influence of plasmons onto the internal cell electricity beyond the previously known plasmon mediated absorption of photons. The model situation we analyze is the hybrid chemical perovskite solar cell CH

_{3}

_{3}

PbI

_{3 - α}

_{α}

with inclusion of core–shell Au/Si0

_{2}

nanoparticles filling pores in the Al

_{2}

_{3}

or TiO

_{2}

porous bases at the bottom of perovskite layer, application of which improved the cell efficiency from 10.7 to 11.4% and from 8.4 to 9.5%, respectively, as demonstrated experimentally, mostly due to the reduction by plasmons of the exciton binding energy. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Materials for Solar Photovoltaic Applications)

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12 pages, 2848 KiB

Open AccessTechnical Note

A Comparative Study of (Cd,Zn)S Buffer Layers for Cu(In,Ga)Se₂ Solar Panels Fabricated by Chemical Bath and Surface Deposition Methods

by Dowon Bae

Materials 2020, 13(7), 1622; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma13071622 - 01 Apr 2020

Cited by 5 | Viewed by 2546

Abstract

Scale-up to large-area Cu(In,Ga)Se₂ (CIGS) solar panels is proving to be much more complicated than expected. Particularly, the non-vacuum wet-chemical buffer layer formation step has remained a challenge and has acted as a bottleneck in industrial implementations for mass-production. This technical note deals with the comparative analysis of the impact on different methodologies for the buffer layer formation on CIGS solar panels. Cd(1-x)ZnxS ((Cd,Zn)S) thin films were prepared by chemical bath deposition (CBD), and chemical surface deposition (CSD) for 24-inch (37 cm × 47 cm) patterned CIGS solar panel applications. Buffer layers deposited by the CBD method showed a higher Zn addition level and transmittance than those prepared by the CSD technique due to the predominant cluster-by-cluster growth mechanism, and this induced a difference in the solar cell performance, consequently. The CIGS panels with (Cd,Zn)S buffer layer formed by the CBD method showed a 0.5% point higher conversion efficiency than that of panels with a conventional CdS buffer layer, owing to the increased current density and open-circuit voltage. The samples with the CSD (Cd,Zn)S buffer layer also increased the conversion efficiency with 0.3% point than conventional panels, but mainly due to the increased fill factor. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Materials for Solar Photovoltaic Applications)

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