SOLAR DESIGN

On-the-fly alterable thin-film solar modules for design driven applications

 Partecipanti

Mappa

 Word cloud

Esplora la "nuvola delle parole (Word Cloud) per avere un'idea di massima del progetto.

 Obiettivo del progetto (Objective)

'The demand for aesthetically integrated photovoltaic materials is increasing steadily in many industries. A growing number of designers, architects and industrial manufacturers across the world share a common interest in using Photovoltaics (PV) as a decentralized and sustainable source of energy in their product designs. Developing markets such as sustainable housing, temporary building structures, outdoor activities, electro-mobility and mobile computing will drive the demand for decentralized, attractive energy solutions. For solar powered products are customisable shapes, sizes, colours, transparencies or specific electrical properties required, which have a decisive influence on the acceptance on the market. Therefore a new breed of solar technologies is necessary. To achieve this goal new flexible production processes and materials need to be developed. A novel manufacturing process will enable the adjustment of all properties of a thin-film module on-the-fly and facilitate the production of customized photovoltaic modules with the desired voltage, size and shape. Combined with the material characteristics given by the underlying thin-film solar cell technology a new-breed of design-led, sustainable and decentralised energy solutions can be realized. Furthermore the designer or architect who wants to incorporate solar electricity into his work needs a service environment to be assisted in the creative process. Tools should support the designer in conceiving, planning and producing the solar design products. This project will address the above mentioned challenges by exploring and developing new materials, manufacturing and business processes in PV powered product design and architecture.'

Introduzione (Teaser)

Big solar panels in buildings may soon become a thing of the past. An EU-funded project seeks to develop new solar technologies for tapping the Sun's bountiful energy directly through building construction materials themselves.

Descrizione progetto (Article)

Aesthetics seems to be one of the driving forces for widespread deployment of building-integrated photovoltaics (BIPV). This tantalising sustainable energy concept provides the opportunity for generating electricity and replacing conventional construction materials. The demand for diverse shapes, sizes, colours and transparency levels is high; however, the products are lacking.

Current PV modules are based on fixed shapes and electric output. Although this may be great for large solar plants, it is costly and inefficient for building designs or other solar-powered products.

Addressing the need for customised PV cells that are flexible and easy to integrate, the EU-funded http://www.solar-design.eu/ (SOLAR DESIGN) (On-the-fly alterable thin-film solar modules for design driven applications) project focuses on developing novel solar cell materials and manufacturing processes.

The project aims to develop new scribing and printing technologies that will enable monolithically interconnected flexible solar modules. The new monolithic interconnection processes should simplify the production of thin-film modules, allowing adjustment of the electrical properties of a PV module in addition to its size and shape.

Another main area of focus is on identifying novel materials for the front surface grid to enable different patterns and colours.

During the first project period, the consortium has achieved significant progress in designing the BIPV and the product-integrated PV prototypes. An important part of the work has been geared towards developing the solar cell fabrication processes. Another task has been to produce custom-made copper-indium-gallium-selenide materials to be deposited on the flexible substrates.

Focus has been placed on achieving selective ablation by laser of the solar cell films that is necessary for producing thin-film solar modules. Other project activities include development of high-precision, large-scale printing technologies that enable exact printing of interconnection layers into the laser-scribed microgrooves.

Except for buildings, thin-film, lightweight and flexible high-performance solar modules are attractive for numerous applications such as electronic devices and electric vehicles. SOLAR DESIGN is expected to accelerate widespread uptake of solar-powered products that will be developed and showcased all over Europe.