Green Energy

Solar Energy, Photovoltaics, and Smart Cities

Suman Lata Tripathi, P. Sanjeevikumar, Suman Lata Tripathi, Sanjeevikumar Padmanaban, Suman Lata Tripathi, Sanjeevikumar Padmanaban

• Publisher: Wiley-Scrivener
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN:
  9781119760764
• eBook ISBN:
  9781119760795
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Physical Sciences
• Subtopic: Energy

Like most industries around the world, the energy industry has also made, and continues to make, a long march toward "green" energy.  The science has come a long way since the 1970s, and renewable energy and other green technologies are becoming more and more common, replacing fossil fuels.  It is, however, still a struggle, both in terms of energy sources keeping up with demand, and the development of useful technologies in this area.

To maintain the supply for electrical energy, researchers, engineers and other professionals in industry are continuously exploring new eco-friendly energy technologies and power electronics, such as solar, wind, tidal, wave, bioenergy, and fuel cells. These technologies have changed the concepts of thermal, hydro and nuclear energy resources by the adaption of power electronics advancement and revolutionary development in lower manufacturing cost for semiconductors with long time reliability. The latest developments in renewable resources have proved their potential to boost the economy of any country.

Green energy technology has not only proved the concept of clean energy but also reduces the dependencies on fossil fuel for electricity generation through smart power electronics integration. Also, endless resources have more potential to cope with the requirements of smart building and smart city concepts.  A valuable reference for engineers, scientists, chemists, and students, this volume is applicable to many different fields, across many different industries, at all levels.  It is a must-have for any library.

1
Fabrication and Manufacturing Process of Solar Cell: Part I

S. Dwivedi

S.S. Jain Subodh P.G. (Autonomous) College, Jaipur, India

Abstract

Crystalline silicon solar cell (c-Si) based technology has been recognized as the only environment-friendly viable solution to replace traditional energy sources for power generation. It is a cost-effective, renewable and long-term sustainable energy source. The Si-based technology has a market growth of almost 20-30% and is projected to attain an energy share of ~100 giga watt (GW) per year in the current fiscal year, 2020. There have been constant efforts in reducing manufacturing cost of solar panel technology, which is about three-four times higher in comparison to traditional carbon-based fuels. In the manufacturing domain, fabrication of three basic c-Si solar cell configurations can be utilized, which are differentiated in the manner of generation of electron-hole (E-H) pairs on exposure to sunlight. The generation of electricity by impinging light on a semiconductor material requires production of electrons and holes such that electrons in the valence band become free and jump to the conduction band by absorbing energy. Thus, jumping of highly energetic electrons to different material generates an electromotive force (EMF) converting light energy into electrical signals. This is known as the photovoltaic (PV) effect.

This chapter is an effort to outline fabrication processes and manufacturing methodologies for commercial production of large area PV modules as an alternative green source of energy.

Keywords: Solar cell, photovoltaics, p-n junction, photovoltaic panels, crystalline silicon solar cell, renewable energy, physics of solar cell, fabrication of solar cell

1.1 Introduction

There has always been a surge to discover newer sources of energy which can be effective alternatives for the orthodox sources of energy, such as, petrol, kerosene, wind energy, thermal power generators [1,2]. In this quest, the sun is a natural huge source of renewable green energy. It is noteworthy that the terrestrial soil is exposed to an enormous amount of solar energy as large as about ten thousand times of all the energy used around the globe. The terrestrial hemisphere facing the sun receives power in excess of 50,000 terawatt (TW) in each instance, which makes reception of an enormous amount of energy possible [3]. Photovoltaics (PV) technology is a technology that relies on this infinite source of sunlight and possesses inherent qualities of highly reduced service costs since the sun provides free energy, reliability, noiseless, minimum maintenance costs and readily installation features [4, 5].

As a matter of fact, thermonuclear fusion reactions happen non-stop at a temperature of millions of degrees to generate huge energy in the form of electromagnetic radiation of sunlight [5,6]. The outer layer of the earth’s atmosphere receives partial energy of the total energy from the sun with a solar constant or an average irradiance of approximately 1367 Wm^-2 with a variation of ±3% [8]. This value of solar constant is dependent on the earth-to-sun distance and on the solar activity. The solar constant is defined as the intensity of solar electromagnetic radiation impinging on a unit surface area and is expressed in units of kWm^-2 and is equal to the integral of the power of the individual frequencies in the spectrum of solar radiation. The geometry of the sun-to-earth distance is displayed in Figure 1.1 given below.

Solar irradiation is the integral of solar irradiance over a particular period of time depicted by kWhm^-2 and the radiation falling on the surface of the earth is actually diffuse radiation [8]. Diffuse radiation is that part of light radiation striking the surface from whole of the sky, while other radiations are the part reflected from the ground, and by surrounding atmosphere. Different types of radiation received by a solar panel [9] are displayed in Figure 1.2 as shown below.

1.1.1 Introduction to Si-Based Fabrication Technology

Photovoltaics technology is a green method of energy production which is based on fabrication and manufacturing of solar cells on platform of Si wafers [9]. In this regard, it is mandatory to know about the Si wafers. So the silicon and its geometry as an integral component of the solar cell technology will be discussed first.

Figure 1.1 The above schematic shows the sun-earth geometry portraying distance between the two celestial objects, diameters and the value of solar constant.

Figure 1.2 The above figure portrays different radiations occurring from the sun which consists of direct, diffuse and reflected radiations.

1.1.2 Introduction to Si Wafer

Silicon is a member of group 14 in the periodic table and is tetravalent metalloid, semiconductor and brittle crystalline solid [10-12]. In 1906, a silicon radio crystal detector was developed as the first silicon-based semiconductor device by Greenleaf Whittier Pickard [13]. Russell Ohl discovered the nonlinear semiconductor devices, p-n junction, and photovoltaic effect in the metalloid Si in 1940 [14]....

Table of contents

• Cover
• Table of Contents
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Preface
• 1 Fabrication and Manufacturing Process of Solar Cell: Part I
• 2 Fabrication and Manufacturing Process of Solar Cell: Part II
• 3 Fabrication and Manufacturing Process of Perovskite Solar Cell
• 4 Parameter Estimation of Solar Cells: A State-of-the-Art Review with Metaheuristic Approaches and Future Recommendations
• 5 Power Electronics and Solar Panel: Solar Panel Design and Implementation
• 6 An Effective Li-Ion Battery State of Health Estimation Based on Event-Driven Processing
• 7 Effective Power Quality Disturbances Identification Based on Event-Driven Processing and Machine Learning
• 8 Sr2SnO4 Ruddlesden Popper Oxide: Future Material for Renewable Energy Applications
• 9 A Universal Approach to Solar Photovoltaic Panel Modeling
• 10 Stepped DC Link Converters for Solar Power Applications
• 11 A Harris Hawks Optimization (HHO)–Based Parameter Assessment for Modified Two-Diode Model of Solar Cells
• 12 A Large-Gain Continuous Input-Current DC-DC Converter Applicable for Solar Energy Systems
• 13 Stability Issues in Microgrids: A Review
• 14 Theoretical Analysis of Torque Ripple Reduction in the SPMSM Drives Using PWM Control-Based Variable Switching Frequency
• 15 Energy-Efficient System for Smart Cities
• 16 Assessment of Economic and Environmental Impacts of Energy Conservation Strategies in a University Campus
• 17 A Solar Energy–Based Multi-Level Inverter Structure with Enhanced Output-Voltage Quality and Increased Levels per Components
• 18 Operations of Doubly Fed Induction Generators Applied in Green Energy Systems
• 19 A Developed Large Boosting Factor DC-DC Converter Feasible for Photovoltaic Applications
• 20 Photovoltaic-Based Switched-Capacitor Multi-Level Inverters with Self-Voltage Balancing and Step-Up Capabilities
• Index
• Also of Interest
• End User License Agreement