Sunrgi Xtreme Concentrated Photovoltaics: Solar Power Competitive With Fossil Fuels?
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada 
on 05. 7.08
Making Solar Power Competitive with Coal?
Sunrgi recently made an impressive claim at the National Energy Marketers Association’s 11th Annual Global Energy Forum in Washington, DC: They say that their system will soon be able to "produce electricity at a wholesale cost of 5 cents per kWh (kilowatt hour). [A] price competitive with the wholesale cost of producing electricity using fossil fuels and a fraction of the current cost of solar energy."
They do it with Xtreme Concentrated Photovoltaics (XCPV) by concentrating the Sun's light close to 2,000 times (!) into extremely efficient solar photovoltaic cells. Part of Sunrgi's patent-pending technology has to do with the cooling of the solar cells, dual-axis sun tracking, and the way the whole system is optimized for mass-production.
Not only are Sunrgi's solar power systems more efficient compared to regular PV, but they also take much less surface area for the same power output.
This chart compares the average output at different times of the year of XCPV, regular PV, and thin film solar. Of course, the results would be different at different geographical locations (this is for Daggett, California), but the trend is obvious.
SUNRGI's XCPV system tracks the sun as it moves across the sky from sunrise to sunset. Typical PV solar systems (such as those mounted on home rooftops) are fixed and do not track the sun. The performance difference between tracking systems and fixed systems is significant. In a day, SUNRGI's tracking system will capture and convert 175% more sunlight than a fixed system at the same advertised peak power rating.
The Future of Solar Power
Now of course, as with other promising solar innovations such as nanowire "hairy" solar panels, moth-eye biomimicry, and 24/7 solar power, the real question is "can they deliver?".
We'll have to wait and see, but with all the different branches of solar innovation coming to light (ah!) these days, we'd be surprised if none of them turned into a serious practical breakthrough. We've mentioned it often: The main goal is to make solar cost-competitive with fossil fuels so that there are no excuses even for the most ardent global warming deniers.
Solar Photovoltaic Power
::Hairy Solar Panels Could Result From Nanowire Breakthrough
::Moth Eyes May Hold Secret to Better Solar Panels
::Video: Past, Present and Future of the Solar Industry
::Solaria: Finding Clever Ways to Make Cheaper Solar Panels
Solar Thermal Power
::Solar Thermal Power in North-Africa: How Much Land to Power the World?
::Ausra: Solar Power Around the Clock, Enough for 90% of U.S. Grid
::Solar Thermal Power: Not Forgotten
::Torresol to Build 3 Solar Thermal Power Plants in Spain for $1.24 Billion
Solar Power Efficiency Records
::19.9%: New Thin Film Solar Efficiency Record
::42.8% Efficiency: A New Record for Solar Cells
::Plextronics Breaks World Record for Organic Solar Cell Efficiency
More on Sunrgi's Xtreme Concentrated Photovoltaics
::Sunrgi Official Site
::New Solar Energy System Makes It Possible to Produce Wholesale Electricity at a Cost Competitive with Fossil Fuels
::Sunrgi To Solve Photovoltaics Cost Problem?
Update: If you are interested in solar power, also check out 15 Photovoltaics Solar Power Innovations You Must See.
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This is great news! If the cooling can be handled correctly and efficiently, focused light solar could possibly be the way solar goes in the future.
Awesome! I must see more of these... To google!
12-15 months though. ='( I wonder if there's a was to DIY this...
1) Very strong magnifying glass.
2) PV Material other than Silicon
3) Heatsink for heat removal.
Doesn't seem too difficult. Just need a special magnifying glass and maybe some gallium arsenide...
The real question everyone should be asking is the cost! How have they brought this previously developed technology down to the cost of fossil fuel. Concentrated PV has been around for a long time but they haven'tever been able to get the cost within the applicable realm. How are they doing this today?
The real question everyone should be asking is the cost! How have they brought this previously developed technology down to the cost of fossil fuel. Concentrated PV has been around for a long time but they haven'tever been able to get the cost within the applicable realm. How are they doing this today?
I didn't learn much Googling. Did anyone else? Production 12 - 15 months away. Their PV cell doesn't have silicon (!). Looks like a set of Fresnel lenses sitting on an extruded aluminum heat sink. Something about proprietary cooling. Private. No Kleiner-Perkins or other big name.
Their comparisons to plain old PV's and to thin film panels assume two axis tracking for Sunrgi and no tracking for the others. Well gosh. I suppose you can make the argument that theirs are smaller or lighter so two axis tracking is easier but still that's a bit deceptive, don't you think?
Of course they're going to report optimistic statistic, but even if it costs twice as much it's still going to be very competitive with fossil fuels.
1- The top of the block seems to be an array of fresnel lenses.
2- Concentrating incoming light 2000:1 will mean that each solar cell will run very hot (~500 C would be my guess...)
If they can pull it off, this looks promising.
why throw away the heat???
The heat captured by this system might be useful on islands and arid coastal areas where seawater can be desalinated with existing low-pressure steam turbine technology that will also produce additional power.
Hope this technology goes well but it really annoys me when people use misleading graphs... the 'area required' graphic is totally misleading. The 2D areas and 3D volumes do not represent the numbers quoted...
B
if they really wanna be smart they should do the 2000:1 for PV but use the heat that their disipating in a heat to electric system, kind of reverse-peltier to push the panels up a bit while cooling at the same time.
To get any extra power from the 'waste' heat here, you would need reliable distributed cooling so that you can keep the PV cells down to their optimum operating temperature *as well* as pumping cooling fluids about the place and running lots of little heat engines.
This simply isn't feasible in the kind of large-scale desert solar PV deployments being considered in the next few years.
Solar *thermal* energy is of course different -- you want the concentrators to produce the highest temperature possible, no need to keep them cool, your heat transfer fluid is very hot and your heat engine is centralised so it gets the same economy of scale as a conventional thermal power station.
When we have large-scale offshore solar PV deployments on the Pacific Ocean, then we can talk about combining concentrating PV with distributed heat engines -- they can dip straight into the ocean for unlimited cooling.