星期四, 22 5 月, 2025
Home PV News European consortium bid to bring 25.4%-efficient heterojunction-IBC solar cell into mass production

European consortium bid to bring 25.4%-efficient heterojunction-IBC solar cell into mass production

The EU-funded Nextbase project aims to manufacture heterojunction, interdigitated back-contact solar modules for less than €0.275/W. Solar panels featuring the Nextbase cell tech are expected to have a conversion efficiency of 23.2%, according to the European Commission.

Source:pv magazine

The Nextbase project backed by the European Commission with €3.8 million, unites European companies and research institutes aiming to manufacture solar panels with heterojunction (HTJ) and interdigitated back-contact (IBC) technology.

A statement issued by the commission said production equipment supplied by Swiss HJT company Meyer Burger would be used to produce 25.4%-efficient HTJ-IBC solar cells on a commercial scale.

That efficiency figure would constitute “a European record for an industrially-feasible version of IBC-SHJ [silicon heterojunction] technology,” said project coordinator Kaining Ding, of German research center Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH, which is a partner in the initiative. Ding added: “The current laboratory world record for a silicon solar cell is 26.7%, which was also based on the IBC-SHJ concept but was very expensive to make. Our approach is close to the optimum level.”

Prototype

Nextbase consortium researchers have developed a prototype four-cell by four-cell solar module they say demonstrated efficiency of 23.2%. The research team said it has also developed a manufacturing process to enable the production of its PV panels for less than €0.275/W, a figure they say is close to that of standard Asian-made PV technologies.

The research project, which has a total budget of €4.4 million, will now attempt to apply the cell technology on large-area modules and industrialize production.

The other project partners are Italian utility Enel, which makes bifacial HJT panels in Catania; the Netherlands-based Delft University of Technology, material sciences company DSM and grant consultancy Uniresearch; German research institutes the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin and Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems; French and Belgian peers the National Solar Energy Institute and Imec, respectively; Switzerland’s École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne and the Swiss Center for Electronics and Microtechnology; Norwegian monocrystalline silicon crystal provider Norwegian Crystals; and the Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

- Advertisment -

Most Popular

Eku Energy acquires Bluestone BESS pipeline

Battery energy storage system (BESS) firm Eku Energy has acquired Bluestone Energy’s BESS portfolio. Eku Energy has taken on seven planned BESS projects from renewable...

Intersolar Europe 2025: Sungrow Debuts Revolutionary Renewable Energy Breakthroughs

Sungrow, the global leading PV inverter and energy storage system (ESS) supplier, showcased a broad range of solar, storage, EV charging, module-level power electronics...

Reliability in Extreme Latitude: Sungrow Deploys 60MWh Battery Storage Project Close to the Arctic Circle

Sungrow, the global leading PV inverter and energy storage system provider, announces the successful deployment of the 60MWh battery storage project in Simo, Finland....

Jinko ESS partners with Filkab to launch dual-track energy storage strategy in Bulgaria

Jinko ESS has announced the signing of a contract with leading Bulgarian energy solutions provider Filkab to implement a dual-track energy storage strategy aimed...