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Published August 2010 | public
Journal Article

Future technology pathways of terrestrial III–V multijunction solar cells for concentrator photovoltaic systems

Abstract

Future terrestrial concentrator cells will likely feature four or more junctions. The better division of the solar spectrum and the lower current densities in these new multijunction cells reduce the resistive power loss (I^(2)R) and provide a significant advantage in achieving higher efficiencies of 45–50%. The component subcells of these concentrator cells will likely utilize new technology pathways such as highly metamorphic materials, inverted crystal growth, direct-wafer bonding, and their combinations to achieve the desired bandgaps while maintaining excellent device material quality for optimal solar energy conversion. Here, we report preliminary results of two technical approaches: (1) metamorphic ~1 eV GaInAs subcells in conjunction with an inverted growth approach and (2) multijunction cells on wafer-bonded, layer-transferred epitaxial templates.

Additional Information

© 2008 Elsevier. Received 8 May 2008; accepted 25 July 2008. Available online 1 October 2008. The authors would like to thank Dimitri Krut, Mark Takahashi, and the entire multijunction solar cell team at Boeing-Spectrolab. This work was supported in part by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory High-Performance Photovoltaic Program and by Boeing-Spectrolab, Inc.

Additional details

Created:
August 22, 2023
Modified:
October 20, 2023