Photovoltaics (PV) is the conversion of light into electricity using semiconducting materials that exhibit the photovoltaic effect, a phenomenon studied in physics, photochemistry, and electrochemistry. The photovoltaic effect is commercially used for electricity generation and as photosensors.
A solar mirror contains a substrate with a reflective layer for reflecting the solar energy, and in most cases an interference layer. This may be a planar mirror or parabolic arrays of solar mirrors used to achieve a substantially concentrated reflection factor for solar energy systems.
A solar cell or photovoltaic cell is an electronic device that converts the energy of light directly into electricity by means of the photovoltaic effect. It is a form of photoelectric cell, a device whose electrical characteristics vary when it is exposed to light. Individual solar cell devices are often the electrical building blocks of photovoltaic modules, known colloquially as "solar panels". The common single-junction silicon solar cell can produce a maximum open-circuit voltage of approximately 0.5 to 0.6 volts.
A solar panel is a device that converts sunlight into electricity by using photovoltaic (PV) cells. PV cells are made of materials that produce excited electrons when exposed to light. The electrons flow through a circuit and produce direct current (DC) electricity, which can be used to power various devices or be stored in batteries. Solar panels are also known as solar cell panels, solar electric panels, or PV modules.
A solar tracker is a device that orients a payload toward the Sun. Payloads are usually solar panels, parabolic troughs, Fresnel reflectors, lenses, or the mirrors of a heliostat.
Spacecraft operating in the inner Solar System usually rely on the use of power electronics-managed photovoltaic solar panels to derive electricity from sunlight. Outside the orbit of Jupiter, solar radiation is too weak to produce sufficient power within current solar technology and spacecraft mass limitations, so radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) are instead used as a power source.
A photovoltaic system, also called a PV system or solar power system, is an electric power system designed to supply usable solar power by means of photovoltaics. It consists of an arrangement of several components, including solar panels to absorb and convert sunlight into electricity, a solar inverter to convert the output from direct to alternating current, as well as mounting, cabling, and other electrical accessories to set up a working system. It may also use a solar tracking system to improve the system's overall performance and include an integrated battery.
Photovoltaic thermal collectors, typically abbreviated as PVT collectors and also known as hybrid solar collectors, photovoltaic thermal solar collectors, PV/T collectors or solar cogeneration systems, are power generation technologies that convert solar radiation into usable thermal and electrical energy. PVT collectors combine photovoltaic solar cells, which convert sunlight into electricity, with a solar thermal collector, which transfers the otherwise unused waste heat from the PV module to a heat transfer fluid. By combining electricity and heat generation within the same component, these technologies can reach a higher overall efficiency than solar photovoltaic (PV) or solar thermal (T) alone.
Concentrator photovoltaics (CPV) is a photovoltaic technology that generates electricity from sunlight. Unlike conventional photovoltaic systems, it uses lenses or curved mirrors to focus sunlight onto small, highly efficient, multi-junction (MJ) solar cells. In addition, CPV systems often use solar trackers and sometimes a cooling system to further increase their efficiency.
There are currently many research groups active in the field of photovoltaics in universities and research institutions around the world. This research can be categorized into three areas: making current technology solar cells cheaper and/or more efficient to effectively compete with other energy sources; developing new technologies based on new solar cell architectural designs; and developing new materials to serve as more efficient energy converters from light energy into electric current or light absorbers and charge carriers.
Cool Earth Solar has developed concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) technology to build solar power plants. The company is headquartered in Livermore, California, US, and in 2008 closed its Series A round of funding with Quercus Trust as the lead investor. The company was founded in 2006 by Dr. Eric Cummings. Energy industry veteran Rob Lamkin joined the company as CEO in 2007.
Solar-cell efficiency refers to the portion of energy in the form of sunlight that can be converted via photovoltaics into electricity by the solar cell.
Amonix, Inc. was a solar power system developer based in Seal Beach, California. The company manufactured concentrator photovoltaic (CPV) products designed for installation in sunny and dry climates. CPV products convert sunlight into electrical energy in the same way that conventional solar photovoltaic technology does, except that they use optics to focus the solar radiation before the light is absorbed by solar cells. According to a comparative study of energy production of solar technologies, CPV systems require no water for energy production and produce more energy per megawatt (MW) installed than traditional PV systems. Amonix had nearly 70 megawatts of CPV solar power systems deployed globally, including Southwestern U.S. and Spain.
The Alamosa Solar Generating Plant is a 35.3 MWp (30.0 MWAC) concentrator photovoltaics (CPV) power station, the largest in the world when it was completed, in May 2012. It is currently the world's third largest operating CPV facility. The output is being sold to Public Service of Colorado, a subsidiary of Xcel Energy, under a long term Power Purchase Agreement.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to solar energy:
The Hatch Solar Energy Center is a 5.88 MWp (5.0 MWAC) photovoltaic power station. It was built by Blattner Energy using 84 dual-axis trackers and Amonix 7700 concentrator photovoltaics (CPV) panels, each of which contains 7,560 Fresnel lenses to concentrate sunlight 500 times onto multijunction photovoltaic cells. It was the largest CPV facility in North America when it was completed in 2011. The facility was subsequently repowered with SunPower panels that use high-efficiency monocrystalline silicon cells without concentration. The output is being sold to El Paso Electric, under a 25-year power purchase agreement (PPA). Annual electricity production is expected to be about 11,000 MW·h/year.
Morgan Solar, Inc. is a Canadian solar power and optical technology company based in Toronto, Ontario. Since 2017, the company has specialized in urban sunlight management, led by its SPOTlight platform. The company also produces in situ IV curve tracers and optical film technologies.
The combination of photovoltaic (PV) technology, solar thermal technology, and reflective or refractive solar concentrators has been a highly appealing option for developers and researchers since the late 1970s and early 1980s. The result is what is known as a concentrated photovoltaic thermal (CPVT) system which is a hybrid combination of concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) and photovoltaic thermal (PVT) systems.
The Eubank Landfill Solar Array is a photovoltaic power station in Albuquerque, New Mexico that consists of 1.0 MWAC of concentrator photovoltaics (CPV) and 1.0 MWAC of flat-panel silicon photovoltaics (PV). It is the only utility-scale CPV system utilizing Suncore third-generation technology that is operational and grid-connected in the US. A portion of the output is being sold to PNM under a Power Purchase Agreement.
The University of Arizona CPV Array is a 2.38 MWp (2.0 MWAC) concentrator photovoltaics (CPV) power station in Tucson, Arizona. It consists of 34 Amonix 7700 systems constructed in the Solar Zone of the University of Arizona's Science and Technology Park (UASTP). It uses all three of the methods available to increase efficiency: dual-axis tracking, Fresnel lens sunlight concentrators, and multi-junction cells. The annual electricity production is expected to be about 3.5 GW·h, and is being sold to Tucson Electric Power (TEP) under a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA).
