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Abstract
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| The benefits of the ultra-high concentration (>1,000 suns) are shown in terms of cost reduction, raw material availability and efficiency increase. The main challenges for the operation at such high concentrations, namely, (a) to keep a low series resistance; (b) to manufacture tunnel junctions with high peak currents and low series resistance; (c) to design and build advanced characterisation methods and tools; and (d) to increase the reliability of the devices are addressed and solutions for them are proposed. As examples of success in manufacturing multijunction solar cells at ultra-high concentration, we have developed and manufactured a GaInP/GaAs dual-junction device, which exhibits an efficiency of 32.6% for a concentration range going from 499 to 1,026 suns. This efficiency is the world record efficiency for a dual-junction solar cell. Besides, the efficiency is still as high as 31% at 3,000 suns. We have extended this strategy to lattice-matched GaInP/Ga(In)As/Ge triple junction solar cells. At the current state of development, such cells show an efficiency of 36.2% at 700 suns. The theoretical optimisation shows that an efficiency well over 40% at 1,000 suns is achievable. | |
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International
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No |
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Book Edition
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Book Publishing
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Springer Verlag |
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ISBN
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978-3-642-23368-5 |
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Series
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Springer Series in Optical Sciences |
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Book title
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Next Generation of Photovoltaics: New concepts |
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From page
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23 |
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To page
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60 |