PRODUCTS Industry News

IBM creates super-efficient solar cell (source: LONDON (Metal-Pages) on 19-May-08)

IBM has unveiled a new technique using an indium and gallium compound to concentrate the sun’s powers and reduce the cost of harvesting solar power.

Such technique is to use a large lens to concentrate the sun’s powers, capturing a record 230 watts onto a 1 cm sq solar cell, in a technology known as concentrated photovoltaics (CPV). That energy is then converted into 70 watts of usable electric power, about five times the electrical power density generated by typical CPV cells in solar farms. If commercialised, could significantly cut the cost of harvesting solar power. According to IBM, it aims to develop efficient photovoltaic structures that would reduce the cost, minimise the complexity, and improve the flexibility of producing solar electric power.

Concentrating the equivalent of 2,000 suns on a square centimetre area to generate enough heat to melt the stainless steel, the cooling technology is where indium and gallium come in, it was able to cool the solar cell from more than 1,600°C to just 85°C. Researchers applied a very thin layer of a liquid metal made of a gallium and indium compound to transfer heat from the solar cell to a copper cooling plate for cooling high power computer chips, by transferring the heat from the chip to the cooling block so that the chip temperature can be kept low. IBM says its liquid metal solution offers the best thermal performance available today, at low costs, and it has successfully coupled this cooling system with a commercial solar cell.

For further information, please refer to www.metal-pages.com on 19 May 08.

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