Millions of Dollars Allotted to Solar Panel Inefficiency

For solar energy entrepreneurs out there looking for a funding boost, the U.S. Department of Energy, or DOE, is now offering a whopping $ 117.6 million under the auspices of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 to solar inventors or startups who have developed cutting-edge solar technologies. Admittedly, $ 17 million is available only to DOE national laboratories like the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, the Argonne National Laboratory, and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, to name a few, but that still leaves the lion’s share of the package open to solar startups looking to advance technological solutions in photovoltaic (PV) energy applications.

This $ 107.6 million is being allotted in packages: $ 51.5 million for advanced PV technologies like solar cells and modules; $ 25.6 million for concentrating solar power (CSP) research and development; and $ 40.5 million to fix the non-technical aspects of solar energy delivery like:

• A lack of information about solar technologies
• Poor consumer awareness
• Inadequate or conflicting product standards
• Insufficient and aging interconnections
• Net metering
• Diverse and conflicting utility rate structures and practices for solar systems
• Conflicting and deficient codes
• Complex, incomprehensible and expensive permitting processes
• Inconsistent and incommensurate state and local financial incentives
• Unequal, sketchy and deficient financing opportunities
• Untrained, inexperienced installers, salesmen and service personnel, and limited opportunities for obtaining appropriate education

President Barack Obama, speaking at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada – the site of the nation’s largest solar array with more than 72,000 panels mounted on single-axis trackers on 140 acres delivering 30 million kilowatt hours of electricity a year, or enough to power 13,200 homes – noted that the Nellis solar farm took about a half a year to complete, created 200 jobs and will save both the U.S. Air Force and the American people who fund it nearly $ 1 million a year.

According to the President, the solar farm will also prevent 24,000 tons of pollution by not using fossil fuels, and serves as a “shining example” of what America can accomplish by harnessing clean renewable energy to build a firmer foundation for economic growth.

And it is, but the $ 107.6 million in funding is needed to address some lingering issues in solar energy, namely solar cell efficiency, thin-film degradation, and tracking system mechanical failures, to name but a few.

Case in point: tracking systems, which can improve solar efficiency by as much as 40 percent, are still prohibitively expensive for most small-solar users. Their increasing complexity, from single axis to azimuth and even dual axis models, increases not only the cost and complexity of the technology, but the inherent tendency of machinery to fail.

Thin-film PV tends to degrade at high temperatures. In fact, a recent study demonstrates that the majority of thin-film degradation occurs within the first 100 hours after fabrication. This, in essence, defeats the fact that thin-film solar is less expensive to manufacture and thus cheaper to install.

Solar cell efficiency is another drawback to increasing solar installation. Though some entities like the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems in Germany are reporting conversion efficiencies of more than 41 percent on a triple-junction cell, few solar cell manufacturers (beyond Sanyo) are reporting efficiencies greater than 23 percent. That’s a lot of wasted sunlight, and a lot of expense for a solar capture of less than one quarter.

If you’re an entrepreneur, or merely a tinkerer with some expertise, visit the DOE’s website at Fed Connect, or see the DOE’s NREL solicitation page and apply for funding. Take your idea or invention to the next level. As politicians have been noting for several decades, the greatest threat to American security may be a reliance on foreign oil, and solar energy is one of the cleanest and most promising ways out of that dilemma.