A Big Step by Turkish Researchers: Efficiency of Solar Cells Increased by 40%!
Turkish researchers at Niğde Ömer Halisdemir University have increased the efficiency of solar cells by 40%. So what does this mean? Here are the details!
Turkish researchers at Niğde Ömer Halisdemir University announced that they have been working on thin film-based solar cells in their project supported by TÜBİTAK for 4 years.
Zübeyde Hanım Vocational School of Health Services Vocational School of Health Services Medical Services and Techniques Department of Opticianry Program Faculty Member Assoc. Prof. Dr. Yavuz Atasoy shared the current data on their work with AA.
Increased Efficiency of Solar Cells
He mentioned that the project, which has been working on for four years at the University’s Central Research Laboratory Nanotechnology Application and Research Center, was developed to increase the efficiency of solar cells.
Explaining that they investigated the cell performance of solar cells formed by the combination of copper, zinc, tin and selenium elements, Atasoy said that they improved the structural and opto-electronic properties of these materials by doping different types of atoms.
“We actually applied different types of materials. We aim to improve the properties of the structures by doping materials such as manganese, germanium and silver into these structures. In this way, we achieved an efficiency improvement of 40 percent. Solar power plants and many solar applications consist of silicon-based solar cells. There are some differences between silicon-based solar cells and the thin-film-based solar cells we focus on. We can talk about some of the advantages of thin-film based cells. In particular, the silicon substrate used in silicon-based solar cells has a thickness of approximately 200 microns, but the thin films we use are 1 percent of this, that is, 1-2 microns, and we can provide the same cell performance with thin film-based cells.”
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Yavuz Atsoy stated that they have made significant progress in thin film-based solar cells. He said that they also reduced the cost considerably due to the fact that the elements used are quite abundant in nature.
As a result of the studies, the efficiency of solar cells was increased by 40% by using different types of elements. Atasay also said the following: “In this sense, we think that it will also provide the opportunity to charge small electronic items such as phones and bluetooth headphones that we use in daily life with portable solar cells.”
