Feels like its been awhile since a module manufacturer touted an efficiency record. The wait is over: Trina Solar Limited announced that its State Key Laboratory of PV Science and Technology of China set a new world conversion efficiency record of 22.61 percent for a high-efficiency p-type mono-crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar cell.
How it happened
The record-breaking solar cell was fabricated on a large-sized boron-doped Cz-Si substrate with a low-cost industrial process of advanced PERC (Passivated Emitter and Rear Cell) technology that integrates back surface passivation, front surface advanced passivation and anti-LID (Light Induced Degradation) technologies. The 243.23 cm2 solar cell reached a total-area efficiency of 22.61%. This result has been independently confirmed by the Fraunhofer ISE CalLab in Germany.
Trina’s record-breaking history
Trina Solar achieved a world conversion efficiency record of 21.40% for a large-area PERC mono-crystalline p-type solar cell in 2014, and the Company subsequently beat this with a 22.13% efficiency record in 2015. In July 2016, Trina Solar announced that its production lines were able to produce the same type of PERC solar cells in large volume with an average efficiency of 21.12%, which is only 1 percentage point less than the record efficiency that was achieved in 2015.
Trina Solar announces that it has broken its previous efficiency record by about a half percentage point, reaching the highest efficiency level to date for a PERC cell fabricated with a low-cost industrial process on a large-area p-type mono-crystalline substrate.
“We want to demonstrate all the possibilities of PERC technology on an industrial scale, and to approach as close as possible to the 25% efficiency level that was achieved by solar researchers at The University of New South Wales in the laboratory more than 17 years ago,” says Pierre Verlinden, VP and Chief Scientist of Trina Solar.
— Solar Builder magazine
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