Day4 Energy Solar Panel Breakthrough: 25% Cheaper, on Sale Within 18 Months
by Michael Graham Richard, Ottawa, Canada 
on 08.14.08
In the Lab vs. Real World
Beating solar PV efficiency records in the lab is great - just recently, a 40.7% record from 2006 was beaten by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) with a new record of... 40.8% - but in the short-term, what matters most is what makes it to market.
25% Cheaper, On Sale Within 18 Months
Day4 Energy, a startup from Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada, has announced that it has created a process to cut costs for multicrystalline silicon solar panels by about 25%, from about $4 per watt to $3 per watt. Still not price-competitive with coal on a large scale, or even with solar thermal power, steady incremental improvements like that will get us there, and for applications where regular solar panels were already used, this will just improve things (either more bang for your buck, or lower prices).
Technical Details
In conventional solar panels, the silicon that converts light into electricity is covered with a network of silver lines that conduct electrons and serve as connection points for soldering together the individual solar cells that make up a panel. The network consists of rows of thin silver lines that feed into thicker wires called bus bars. Day4 replaces these bus bars with a new electrode that consists of rows of fine copper wires coated with an alloy material. The wires are embedded in an adhesive and aligned on a plastic film. The coated copper wires run on top of and perpendicular to the thin silver lines, connecting them to neighboring cells. The new electrode conducts electricity better than the silver lines, resulting in less power loss. It also covers up less of the silicon than the bus bars, leaving more area for absorbing light.
Production
Day4 Energy currently has enough production capacity to make enough panels to generate 47 megawatts a year (up from 12 megawatts in 2007), but they are still making panels using only half of their new technology, the electrodes, but not the new cell design yet. Their current panels are 14.7% efficient. The next step is switching production over to the new 17-18% efficient cells, and then if they can successfully do that, they will probably want to ramp up production.
Interestingly, Technology Review and the Day4 press release have different efficiency numbers. TR claims 17% while Day4 says 18%. The truth probably lies somewhere in between. Maybe Day4 rounded things up generously for their press release, maybe tests generated a whole range of results, etc.
Many competitors of Day4 Energy promise solar panels that are more efficient and/or cheaper, but most of those are a few years away.
Solar Power
Duke Energy Announces 20 Megawatt Solar Power Project in North-Carolina
Solar Industry Creates Scheme to Recycle Solar Panels in Europe
Acciona Energia to Build Two 50-Megawatt Solar Thermal Power Plants in Spain
More on Day4 Energy
Day4 Energy Official Site
More-Efficient Solar Cells
Update: If you are interested in solar power, also check out 15 Photovoltaics Solar Power Innovations You Must See.
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That's cool. I remember how expensive pvs were in the 70s. impressive how cheap they are getting, even if not cheap enough. a few more years and they'll be everywhere
It's time for authors to drop the comparison of solar, PV or thermal, to "coal" or "average kWh rates". Solar competes with neither in the market.
Solar provides peak demand power, the most expensive electricity.
Solar becomes financially viable when it can deliver power to the grid for what is currently being paid for peak power which can be 2x to 4x the 'average' rate.
Power at night is so abundant that the rate paid approaches zero per kWh. Sometimes nighttime power is so abundant that there isn't demand for more and power is simply dumped.
Bob, I suppose that's true if you are building a power plant, but if you are a homeowner or a business (especially if you are somewhere without real-time pricing), the incentives are different.
I suppose that's another argument in favor of real-time pricing and a smart grid...
One thing that concerns me is this:
"The wires are ... aligned on a plastic film"
Plastic deteriorates when exposed to heat and UV radiation. I wonder if these things will have the same lifespan as standard PV panels.
@ Bob & Anon,
As well, coal should have a premium put on its cost to account for the damage it does by contributing to global warming. Then solar would be much more competitive.
PV certainly can compete with coal today if you can afford the upfront costs. Right now systems will approximately pay for themselves over their guaranteed lifespan, and most will last a good deal longer. Unless you own a coal plant, and I'm guessing not many TreeHuggers do, 20 years from now you could have your PV system making money for you, or you could be thinking about all the money you gave away to the electric company.
A bit offtopic, but since it's mentioned in the article, what happend to the 42,8% percent record?
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/08/428_efficiency.php
That is for a solar cell on earth, the linked 40,8% one is for high radiation (space) use.
Anyway, medium efficiency for lower price is still very nice!
How does the Day4 modules compare in cost, quality and efficiency with the Evergreen Solar and Canadian Solar? Thank you.
dave
How does the Day4 modules compare in cost, quality and efficiency with the Evergreen Solar and Canadian Solar? Thank you.
dave