Keven Bullis, of MIT's Technology Review reports DuPont Inks a Deal to Improve Solar Cells. With the acquisition of Innovalight, "DuPont will double the size of its $1 billion solar business, and develop new ways to make solar cells."
Power ink: Innovalight makes a black ink of suspended silicon nanoparticles.
Photo Credit: Innovalight
DuPont just bought Innovalight, a company that makes silicon ink that increases the efficiency of certain types of solar cells.
DuPont is already one of the largest suppliers of solar panel materials, selling products including the silver paste used to make electrical contacts on solar cells, and polymers and resins for sealing solar cells against the elements.
Innovalight manufactures silicon inks that can increase a cell's efficiency from about 18 percent to 19 percent, a significant improvement in the solar industry. Printing the inks in patterns on the surface of a silicon solar cell helps the cell absorb more light. Innovalight also licenses a manufacturing platform for applying the inks to solar cells, a technology that has been licensed by several Chinese solar cell makers, including JA Solar.
Dupont hopes the acquisition will enable both companies to develop new applications, and products based on the silicon ink technology.
Innovalight was originally founded with the intention of printing entire solar cells using its ink, but the company found it difficult to compete with Chinese solar panel makers, which have come to dominate production worldwide in recent years. Now Innovalight's strategy is to license innovations that can be introduced into existing solar panel manufacturing lines; this offers one way for U.S. companies to succeed in the solar panel industry without competing with Chinese companies. ...
In a conventional solar cell, electrical contacts on the front block 6 percent to 7 percent of incoming light.
Rob Cockerill already sees a way silicon ink could be used on the back surface of solar panels, where manufacturing defects can trap electrons, that could improve efficiencies another 1%.
Please note that the 1% improvement on an absolute scale from 18% to 19% is approximately, a 5% improvement relative to the existing base efficiency.
Isn't it cool to watch competition eek out these efficiency advances 1% at a time?
The net result in the long-term is better performance, and cost-efficiency for consumers.