- News
20 December 2017
Solar Frontier raises thin-film solar cell efficiency record from 22.6% to 22.9%
© Semiconductor Today Magazine / Juno Publishing
Tokyo-based Solar Frontier – the largest manufacturer of CIS (copper indium selenium) thin-film photovoltaic (PV) solar modules – says that, in joint research with the National Research and Development Agency’s New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) in Japan on a 1cm2 cell, it has set a new record for thin-film solar cell energy conversion efficiency of 22.9%, as verified independently by the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) in November.
The new record is a 0.3 percentage point increase over the existing record of 22.6% that was set in February 2016 by ZSW (Zentrum für Sonnenenergie- und Wasserstoff-Forschung — or Center for Solar Energy and Hydrogen Research — Baden-Württemberg) in Stuttgart, Germany.
The latest achievement was enabled through technologies such as CIS absorber engineering and enhanced surface treatment of the absorber layer, which Solar Frontier says demonstrates the steady progression of thin-film technology.
ZSW regains thin-film solar cell efficiency record with 22.6% CIGS PV cell