Funding Opportunity: SuNLaMP
SunShot Subprogram: Photovoltaics
Location: National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Golden, CO
Amount Awarded: $2,000,000

This project aims to demonstrate potentially disruptive, novel photovoltaic (PV) absorbers by developing proof-of-concept PV device prototypes composed of defect-tolerant inorganic thin film oxide/nitride absorbers. “Defect tolerance” is the tendency of a semiconductor to maintain good transport and doping properties despite the presence of crystallographic defects and is a key property of promising PV materials.

APPROACH

The project will use the rapid development approach, which combines high-throughput theory with accelerated experiments to rapidly optimize materials and architectures focusing on the sulfide/selenide and oxide/nitride PV technologies that are compatible with existing low-capex large-scale manufacturing processes.

INNOVATION

This project aims to demonstrate 10-20% prototype cells with novel and potentially disruptive PV absorbers and trigger extensive PV R&D community efforts towards 20-30% efficiency.