Affordable Power with Three Innovative Solar Technologies

We offer three solar technologies, highlighted in Fig.1, to generate solar power at 50% efficiency leading to a high affordability.

1. An optical concentrator: shown in Fig.1a concentrates the sun 10,000x into optical fibers for reducing the solar cell cost by 10,000x.
2.  An ultra-light optical fiber platform: shown in Fig.1b channels the 10,000 suns into a single micro solar cell for an efficient light collection.
3. A single micro solar cell: shown in Fig.1c converts all the energy from the solar spectrum with 6 photovoltaic junctions for a 50% efficiency in conversion.

The consequences these technologies will bring are:

1. A low cost cell produces an affordable solar module to industries and common man.
2. An affordable solar module becomes competitive against fossil power.
3. A competitive solar module creates a viable dominant energy source.
4. A dominant solar energy becomes the viable source to halt climate change.

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Fig.1. Our 3 technologies: 10,000x concentrator, fiber channels, and 6-J photovoltaic cell.

50%-Efficient Solar Module:

Our current solar-energy product is the 50%-efficient module, shown in Fig.2 – depicting its top and side views - designed for homes, buildings, and power plants, capable of a 50% efficiency due primarily to:

1. The 6 junctions micro photovoltaic cell converting nearly all the energy from the sun.
2. The optical concentrators concentrating 10,000 suns into the optical fibers.
3. The optical fibers channeling of the 10,000 suns onto the micro cell.

At a 50% efficiency, this module sized at 96in x 48in is capable of producing 1.5 kw at AM0 (air mass zero) in space or 1.0 kw at AM1 on the ground:

Module power = (AM0, 0.13 kw/cm²)x(50% conversion efficiency)x(80% optical efficiency)x(module area, 96x48x2.54 cm²) = 1.5 kw (space), or 1.0 kw (ground).

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Fig.2. Our current 96in x 48in solar module with a 50% efficiency producing 1.0 kw at AM1.

Current Affordable Solar Module:

The key aspect of our current solar module is its high affordability for installation in homes, buildings, and power plants, at < $2/w installed or @ < $0.12/kwh (in the USA), a cost threshold deemed competitive against fossil power. This is due to:

1. The 6-J cell’s microchip-size costs pennies due to sun concentration.
2. The optical concentrator costs dollars due to a simple molding in plastic.
3. The optical fiber costs dollars due to a commercially-available product.

Our cost modeling (common in the industry) of our modules with 10,000-sun concentration contrasting with 1-sun flat panels using poly-Si as cells is given in Fig.3, showing unit power cost in $/kwh, or $/w installed plotted against cell cost in $/cm². This shows that our 10,000-sun module out performed the flat-panel module substantially, and is capable of $2/w or $0.12/kwh threshold to compete against fossil power. More importantly, these costs will be reduced as more advanced technologies are injected continually in the marketplace to create more advanced and less costly modules.

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Fig.3. Cost model of our 10,000-sun module contrasting with the 1-sun flat panel in use today.