SunPower Corp. (Nasdaq: SPWRA, SPWRB) announced this week that it has produced a full-scale solar cell with a sunlight to electricity conversion efficiency of 24.2% at its manufacturing plant in the Philippines.
This is a new world record, confirmed by the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL), for large area silicon wafers.
Improved cell efficiency reduces the levelized cost of energy by increasing the energy production from each wafer manufactured into a solar cell. For the same reason, increased efficiency reduces the cost per watt and cost per kilowatt-hour for feedstock and materials, depreciation and other manufacturing expenses, installation time, land and system operations, and related maintenance.
SunPower currently sells solar modules with 22% efficiency and will step up to 23.4% later this year. The 24.2% record was achieved with the same production technology the company currently uses, which means additional improvements in the commercial line are likely to appear in the next year or two.
Dr. Richard Swanson, SunPower founder and chief technology officer, said the company has increased cell efficiency by a full four percentage points over the last five years.
The company is now approaching the theoretical limits of crystalline silicon solar efficiency, which is 29%. And practical limits of solar modules, which have lower efficiencies than the solar cells contained within them, are probably around 25%.
Once the majority of solar companies max out the potential of crystalline solar, they are likely to turn to concentrator cells to gain additional efficiencies.
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