Exploring a New Transparent Solar Cell Breakthrough

sponsored by brilliant among renewables solar energy has been growing rapidly and driving the world towards a low-carbon future we've been seeing a wave of innovations in the field like perovskite solar cells solar tiles and roofs and organic panels but what if we could harvest solar energy from the windows and skylights of our homes and skyscrapers or even from our car windows and cell phone screens let's explore transparent solar panels and how they stack up against conventional panels could transparent solar cells be the future of solar energy or is the future still not so clear i'm matt farrell welcome to undecided [Music] in modern society we see glass everywhere ranging in size from a small cell phone screen to huge windows and skyscraper facades it's estimated that there are five to seven billion square meters of glass surfaces in the united states so imagine that number for the whole world and in most buildings these large areas of glass remain an unused energy potential now according to the international energy agency or the iea buildings in the construction sector add up to one third of the total energy consumption in the world that represents 40 percent of the total direct and indirect carbon emissions into the atmosphere and even though we've seen some progress there which i've talked about in previous videos there is a long pathway to decarbonize buildings around the world designs that employ passive heating and natural illumination through triple glazed windows and use rooftop solar panels they look great but what if we could go one step further what if we could tap into all of that solar energy potential passing through those glass facades and windows not only to provide natural illumination and heating but to produce electricity enter transparent solar panels now photovoltaic glass as the technology is also called is a see-through type of solar panel and unlike traditional mono or polycrystalline silicon panels which are opaque this new technology is manufactured to provide some level of transparency and in theory these panels can be employed in anything from small mobile devices such as cell phones to huge windows of skyscrapers but while standard solar panels absorb visible light to produce power a truly transparent solar panel works based on a counter-intuitive idea capturing invisible light and letting visible light pass through it the term transparent solar panel makes most of us think of something that's as transparent as glass which is just a little bit misleading technically this term can refer to both a panel that's completely or only partially see-through so let's take a look at the two types of transparent solar panels the first one is partially transparent solar panels these panels are manufactured using a thin film technology where ultra thin layers of semiconductor materials are deposited over a sheet of glass then another sheet of glass is glued on top to form a tasty semiconductor sandwich these ultra thin layers of semiconductor material are only a few microns thick and it's what makes these solar panels become transparent and each layer that you add increases the opacity just a little bit while current silicon panels like you have on your rooftop achieve efficiencies above 20 the efficiency of standard thin film solar panels is considerably lower at around seven to ten percent a great application of partially transparent solar panels is in office buildings where the sunlight is intense so the panels are installed in order to reduce the sunlight level that goes into the building in order to control the internal heating of buildings engineers take into account the solar heat gain coefficient or the shgc when designing their windows and skylights the shgc basically measures the amount of available solar heat that can pass through the glass the higher this percentage the more heat goes into the building the shgc of onyx's panels one of the leaders in transparent photovoltaic glass for buildings range from 10 to 40 percent limiting the solar heat that goes into the building while producing electricity at the same time the second type is fully transparent solar panels the dream of having solar panels that would look like regular glass started with a group of researchers at michigan state university which created the first fully transparent solar cell in 2014. the team created the transparent luminescent solar concentrator or tlsc which uses organic salts to capture a very specific portion of the solar spectrum of wavelengths of invisible light like ultraviolet and infrared while allowing normal visible light to pass through when suddenly hits the panel uv and ir light is turned into a different type of infrared that glows then this new wavelength moves to the edge of the window where it's converted into electricity by solar cells around the edge since the materials don't absorb or emit light in the visible spectrum they look transparent to the human eye the transparent solar panel created by the researchers achieved an 86 transparency level unfortunately the efficiency of this prototype was very low less than one percent but they said that there's a potential of reaching 10 efficiency compared to conventional silicon based panels it's obviously a big negative that the efficiency of transparent panels is just so low but when it comes to solar panels efficiency is not everything the low efficiency of transparent solar panels means that we need a larger area covered for the same amount of power that a 20 efficient rooftop array could create however given the transparent solar panels can be integrated into buildings there's more potential surface area to compensate for the lower efficiency an interesting advantage of partially transparent solar panels is that thin film solar cells can achieve high efficiencies even when they're not at optimal tilting angles which is great for buildings and skyscrapers where the windows are installed vertically thin film cells are also more tolerant of heat having a lower decrease in efficiency than traditional crystalline silicon solar panels at high temperatures fully transparent solar panels have a clear advantage over partially transparent versions since they can turn any glass sheet or window into a photovoltaic cell they look better and they have a wider range of use cases but their big negative isn't just their low efficiency transparent solar panels utilize organic solar cells which degrade more rapidly than inorganic solar cells thin film for example lasts 10 to 20 years while panels based on crystalline silicon have average lifespans of 25 years or more although there are still many improvements to be made the benefits and wide range of applications mainly in the building sector has led companies around the world to explore the technology before getting to where we're seeing this tech show up today if you're interested in learning more about the principles behind solar i'd strongly recommend checking out the solar energy course at brilliant it's a fun hands-on approach that really helped me wrap my head around some of the central pillars of how solar power works everything from the basics of photovoltaics to solar thermal power to photon absorption it's really a good one but even if that course doesn't make your brain light up there's going to be something else for you to enjoy they have over 60 courses including topics in scientific thinking quantum mechanics and applied science they've got something for everybody all the concepts are taught through fun and interactive challenges to help you understand the why of something not just the how it helps to develop your intuition which is my favorite part about brilliant and it taps into the way i learn and it just makes it fun go to brilliant.org undecided to sign up for free the first 200 people will get 20 off their annual premium membership thanks to brilliant and to all of you for supporting the channel so back to where we're seeing or not seeing transparent solar panels spring up onyx solar is one of the leaders in transparent foldable take glass the company offers two technologies of solar glass one based on amorphous silicon and another uncrystalline silicon with options ranging from zero to thirty eight percent transparency their panes use layers of heat-treated safety glass and can be customized to fit specific projects into anything like curtain walls canopies or even floors but i'll step on that in a minute an interesting project using their photovoltaic skylight is the mcdonald's flagship restaurant at walt disney world in florida the building became a zero energy building in the first zero emission restaurant in the u.s the system is expected to produce over 2 million kilowatt hours of electricity over 35 years and have a payback time in less than four years another product from onyx is their pv facade among its projects the company created the facade for the world's largest coca-cola bottling plant in monterey mexico it consists of 370 large-sized grey amorphous silicon glass modules and a 20 transparency and it can produce around 17 200 kilowatt hours of energy overall this project is expected to have a payback time in less than one year and reduce heating and cooling energy demand by 24 percent but you could also take a huge step into the future and onto a photovoltaic floor with the company's pv pavers they're designed to be used for pedestrian traffic and can withstand up to 400 kilograms or about 880 pounds on top of that they can be customized in a wide range of colors and use the same installation procedures as metal framing and wood floors one project that's gaining traction is a manhattan penthouse that used 50 glass pavers for innovative and solar harnessing terrace the system reduced 19 of the penthouse's heating and cooling demands and produces electricity at a cost of about a penny talk about taking a walk on the bright side when it comes to cost their pv glass costs about 50 dollars per square meter while a typical solar panel costs usually about 40 to 110 dollars per square meter and a typical double-paned window costs about 24 to 45 dollars per square meter here in massachusetts including material and insulation costs now as cool as those are transparency levels aren't good enough for applications where you need clear windows that look like common glass for that you'd want to look at the australian-based clearview which has been manufacturing solar panels that are clear with just a minor tint and have no visual distortion achieving a transparency of 70 their technology is composed of several layers but in short their glazing system consists of nano and micro particles scattered over an interlayer of thin film sandwiched between panes of glass the price per square meter for a triple glazed low emissive insulated glass from clearview is 400 now comparatively a common triple pane window ranges from 270 to 430 dollars per square meter one of their projects was the work shopping center atrium in perth australia the installation includes 18 triple glazed low emissive pv glass panes that provide power to the indoor lighting outdoor signage and the display of the shopping center and according to an article from the company each solar window of this building was able to produce approximately 0.1 kilowatt hours from 6 to 7 hours of sun depending on the project the company estimates the financial payback period can be as low as a year the carbon payback is less than 9 years compared to 100 years for typical double-glazed windows they claim that by using inorganic materials these pv windows can produce power for more than 20 years with a 0.5 efficiency loss per year but again when we come back to the efficiency it's still not that great today their industry standard 3.5 by 1.6 meter solar window can give about 30 watts per square meter while a typical 340 watt solar panel can give about 200 watts per square meter that means to produce the same power of a rooftop pv system we need six times more area for the transparent solar panels to equal out but that's where we get back to some of the really interesting research that's being done aiming to increase the efficiency the university of michigan and the team led by stephen forrest has been getting interesting results they've been exploring the use of organic materials in the panels but the main challenge is how to prevent the rapid degradation to overcome that problem the team has been adding layers to the sun-facing side of the glass they tried multiple materials in various tests but the latest one with follow rain materials has shown some promise they tested this new transparent solar panel under several conditions like simulated sunlight that could shine for the equivalent of one sun up to 27 suns and temperatures up to 150 degrees fahrenheit or 65 degrees celsius the conclusion was the solar cells could still provide 80 of their power even after 30 years they've also achieved a 40 transparency and believe it's possible to increase that number to 60 percent and they're also working hard to raise that 10 efficiency up to 15 at higher transparencies it's not hard to see that transparent solar panels still have a challenging pathway to full transparency at higher efficiencies or at least efficiencies closer to typical panels and power densities at a reasonable cost for the market today with an efficiency lower than 10 percent and power densities of 30 watts per square meter this technology still requires a considerably larger area to produce the same amount of power that a rooftop system can give you but it's also important to remember that the university of michigan increased the original one percent efficiency in 2014 to about 10 percent in 2021. that's significant and really exciting hopefully the technology becomes more cost competitive in time but what do you think do you think we'll be seeing transparent solar in most of our buildings and maybe even our cars laptops and smartphones jump in the comments and let me know and thanks as always to my patrons their direct support really helps to produce these videos speaking of which if you like this video be sure to check out one of the ones i've linked to right here and be sure to subscribe and hit that notification bell if you think i've earned it thanks so much for watching i'll see in the next one

Channel: Undecided with Matt Ferrell

Views: 334,152

Keywords: solar cell, solar cell efficiency, solar cell manufacturing, solar cell manufacturing process, solar cell transparent, solar cell working, solar cell working principle, perovskite solar cell, solar cells working principle, solar energy, solar panel system, solar panel system for home, solar panels, solar panels for home, solar power, solar windows, transparent solar cells, transparent solar panels, transparent solar windows, undecided with matt ferrell

Id: uqyCjrQyT4U

Length: 13min 5sec (785 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 16 2021