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Crystalline silicon wafers offer higher performance, but at higher costs (due to the relatively high cost of starting monocrystalline and multicrystalline silicon wafers). These different approaches are at opposite ends of the price-performance scale. On the other hand, thin-film (amorphous and polycrystalline) technologies using silicon and other semiconductor absorber materials (such as amorphous silicon, CdTe, or CIGS) may offer significant cost advantages compared to crystalline silicon wafer-based solar cells. On the one hand, crystalline silicon (c-Si) wafers may serve as the basis for solar cell formation (currently accounting for more than 90% of the solar PV market). In the price-sensitive solar cell market, two principal technology options exist. As the costs of solar cells and modules (typically expressed as $/W p) are reduced, grid-tied solar photovoltaic applications are gaining acceptance at an'accelerated pace, making them an attractive option for significant proliferation in electricity generation. The solar photovoltaic electricity generation, which currently accounts for less than 0.1% of the global electricity generation, may be substantially expanded if it achieves cost parity with conventional grid electricity. However, due to relatively low solar cell efficiencies (e.g., less than 12% for most thin-film technologies and roughly 12% to 18% for most crystalline silicon solar cell technologies), high costs of raw materials (e.g., silicon for crystalline silicon wafer solar cells) and manufacturing processes, limitations on cost-effective and efficient electrical storage, and a general lack of infrastructure to support solar cell proliferation, to date there has been limited use of this energy solution (currently, electricity generation by solar photovoltaics accounts for less than 0.1% of total worldwide electricity generation).įor commercial applications, cost of energy to the end-user (e.g., in cents/kWh for electricity) should be sufficiently low and comparable to or even better than that from utility grids using conventional electricity generation sources.
Three thin film solarcell driver#
A key driver for this market pull is a rising public awareness of environmentally-benign technologies. Much of the earth's surface receives a significant amount of annual sun-hours which may be effectively harnessed for clean and secure electricity generation. The sun provides more energy to the earth in one hour than the annual energy consumption of the entire world. Key attributes that make solar energy attractive are the abundant, worldwide, point-of-use supply of sunlight, environmental friendliness, scalability (from milliwatts to megawatts), secure point-of-use generation of solar electricity, and excellent distributed energy economics.
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Solar photovoltaic (PV) electricity generation using solar cells is uniquely suited to meet the needs of residential, commercial, industrial, and centralized utility applications. Increasingly expensive, unreliable, and environmentally-risky fossil fuels and a rising global demand for energy, including electricity, have created the need for alternate, secure, clean, widely available, cost-effective, environmentally-friendly, and renewable forms of energy. Renewable, high-efficiency, and cost-effective sources of energy are becoming a growing need on a global scale. This disclosure relates in general to the field of photovoltaics and solar cells, and more particularly to three-dimensional (3-D) Thin-Film Solar Cells (TFSCs) and methods for manufacturing same. 6, 2007, which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety. This application is a continuation of U.S.