Light Enhancement of Solar Module

Hsin-Hsin Hsieh,Jen-Loong Hwang,Chia-Yu Lin,Jang-Hsing Hsieh

doi:10.4236/epe.2014.614044

Abstract

This paper presents sputtered-deposited Ag nanoparticles (NPs) on the encapsulant material (ethylene vinyl acetate, EVA) with the variation of annealing condition on crystalline silicon solar cell to enhance the light intensity, and a conventional solar cell is also performed for comparison. It was found that an increase in the transmittance at the wavelength of 500 - 800 nm was detected in the Ag nanoparticle solar cells. And red-light enhancement of around 2% was measured in the Ag-sputtered solar module under annealing condition of 700℃ for 3 min from incident photon to converted electron (IPCE) profile. The photovoltaic performance of solar modules was characterized by a flasher system in AAA class (temporal instability, spectral match, and irradiance non-uniformity). The IV curve showed a current enhancement with Ag-EVA sample, and thus a high power output around 0.250 W was observed. A high fill factor of 73.63% also implied a high performance in series and shunt resistance. Surface plasmonic resonance effects of Ag nanoparticles deposited on the surface of solar cell were examined and discussed. This paper not only illustrated the performance of the surface plasmonic resonance of a solar device but also verified the application in the industrial production.

Highlights

Renewable energy has become a blooming trend on both academic research and industrial production due to the limited natural energy resources
According to the IV measurement of solar module containing Ag-EVA, it is confirmed that the optical enhancement can be realized in solar module and the power output increased of 4.7%
Research results can be addressed as below: 1) With an annealing condition of 700 ̊C for 3 min, surface plasmonic resonance effect of Ag nanoparticles is significantly observed with high transmittance of higher than 90% at wavelength 500 - 800 nm. 2) According to SEM morphology, the optimized surface plasmonic resonance effect is observed at particle size of 150 nm in diameter

Summary

Introduction

Renewable energy has become a blooming trend on both academic research and industrial production due to the limited natural energy resources. According to the previous literature [5] [6], optical enhancement can be approached by producing light trapping effect on the cell surface and depositing anti-reflection coating on the surface. These technologies are applied to increase the reflectance path in the solar device; an even efficient way to enhance the absorption is to produce surface plasmonic resonance effect [7] on the cell surface. This study is to realize the surface plasmonic resonance of Ag nanoparticles on crystalline solar cell and the module performance is proved

Experimental

Surface Morphology

Performance of Device

Findings

Conclusions