online tco glass: thin film solar cells are inseparable from you
---- reproduced science and technology daily newspaper july 22, 2011 text · reporter teng jipu
for the glass is no stranger to you, to understand the "online tco glass" the twist of the term? why is it so rare?
urging solar energy as part of the clean energy alternative to conventional energy, it seems that the development of new energy is one of the most effective way, so the solar cell naturally become a breakthrough in the low-carbon economic torrent. the end of june this year, china's ministry of science and technology, the ministry of finance and the national energy board issued a "do the 2011 golden sun demonstration work notice", is seen as to further expand the scale of domestic photovoltaic power generation applications to promote the development of strategic emerging industries express.
thin-film solar cells are considered to be the development of bright new solar cells, and its important components tco glass production technology has been in the hands of foreign investors, china's thin film solar cell development lingering shackles. at the end of last year, in the abalone known as fujian dongshan, china's first online tco coated glass production line ignition production, then here will be built a domestic first-class photovoltaic and glass new material industry base. this indicates that the development of thin film solar cells will soon return to their own hands.
in the case of
recently, kibing group in xiamen, fujian and dongshan, respectively, held a "online tco glass products to promote exchanges" and "online tco glass seminar." from the chinese renewable energy society, the national photovoltaic industry, tsinghua university, xiamen university, more than 10 colleges and universities more than 20 experts and scholars, as well as the united states to the new solar energy, taiwan union photoelectric, hannover holdings, jun shi energy, xiamen cable and so on more than 30 domestic and foreign enterprises participated in the event, everyone on the photovoltaic industry and deep-seated areas of development of technology and business were discussed and research, kibing online tco products to achieve the performance indicators given fully affirmative.
"online tco glass": previously only japanese production
tco glass transparent conductive oxide the abbreviation of a glass is a component formed by uniformly coating a transparent conductive oxide film on a flat glass surface by physical or chemical coating. "online" refers to the process of producing glass in the process of coating. "the tco was first discovered in 1907 and was first applied to the windshield of the aircraft in 1940. after continuous development and research, it was used not only in the production of solar cells but also in the production of solar cells," said kubing group technology r & d center vice president hou yinglan. it is used in displays, heat mirrors, transparent surface heaters, flexible light emitting devices and radar shielding protection.
according to reports, tco glass has a high transmittance to visible light, and itself has a high conductivity. for amorphous silicon thin film solar cells, since the intermediate semiconductor layer has almost no lateral conductivity, it is necessary to use tco glass to efficiently collect the current of the battery while the tco film has an anti-reflective function to allow most of the light to enter the absorber layer; tco glass spectral transmittance, conductivity, haze and other properties are required. with the development of thin-film solar cell market, tco glass market has become very tight, it can be said that the development of thin-film battery to a certain extent depends on the improvement of tco glass.
"tco glass production control in the hands of a small number of foreign manufacturers, such as the board of blue, asahi." hou yinglan said, "china in recent years, although a number of research institutions and companies to apply for tco coating invention patents, but still not really industrial, the equipment is still under the control of foreign manufacturers, and the technical difficulties in the design of process and equipment are not broken.
on december 28 last year, drums, kibing group built the first in the country, the world's third day melting 600 tons of online tco coated glass production line ignition production, the production line used by the technology is the world's high-end glass products technology the previously, its products only japan asahi glass and the united kingdom pilkington two companies to produce.
thin-film solar cells pulled tco glass with high demand
"solar cells (photovoltaic cells) are mainly divided into crystalline silicon cells and thin-film batteries, the current crystalline silicon accounted for 80% of the pv market share, thin film batteries accounted for about 20%." hou yinglan introduced road.
crystalline silicon solar cells are divided into monocrystalline silicon solar cells and polycrystalline silicon solar cells, the technology is relatively mature, the conversion rate of up to 20% -25%. crystal silicon cell manufacturing to consume a lot of power and silicon materials, and thin film solar cell thickness of only a few microns to tens of microns, consumption of materials is crystalline silicon cells 1%, can be deposited in glass, stainless steel, plastic, ceramics, the scope wide, can save a lot of silicon materials, the use of appropriate production process, can be a large area of deposition, greatly improve production efficiency and reduce production costs, so thin film solar cells are considered the most promising new solar cells.
therefore, the tco glass demand curve is in a very strong rising range. at present, amorphous silicon thin film solar cells have exceeded 10% of the photovoltaic industry, according to nanomarkets forecast, 2009-2015 period of thin film battery production will be 16 times the growth of space, compound growth rate of up to 58%; and in accordance with the current domestic manufacturers of the expansion plan, the domestic thin-film solar cell business will significantly expand the expansion of demand for high-growth tco glass.
online coating has obvious advantages
on-line tco coated glass coating technology using chemical vapor deposition (cvd method), hou yinglan said that the chemical vapor deposition method is the world's major production of online coated glass method, in the float glass production line tin tank length direction choose to meet the requirements of the production process temperature zone, insert a number of coating reactor for coating.
chemical vapor deposition (cvd) is the most widely used technology in the semiconductor industry for the deposition of a wide range of materials, including a wide range of insulating materials, most metallic materials and metal alloy materials. theoretically, two or more gaseous raw materials are introduced into a reaction chamber, and then they react chemically with each other to form a new material deposited on the glass surface.
hou yinglan explained the meaning of "online": "there is no domestic online production of online tco coated glass, online success, then it will be able to open up a new milestone in online tco glass. online production advantage is the first line of two, to regulate the production flexible, in the float on the use of chemical vapor deposition (cvd) production of coated glass, according to market needs, flexible adjustment of its product variety, can produce float glass, but also the production of other varieties of coated glass. in addition, online tco glass photoelectric performance is stable, high yield, good weather resistance.
as a result of the unique film structure and formula design, high yield, but also has excellent photoelectric properties, hou yilan for their own production of online tco coated glass is very confident, but many manufacturers for long-term use of imported foreign products, the domestic production tco glass also has a test and application process.
"but with the continuous expansion of kibingtco production capacity and excellent photoelectric performance, i believe will soon occupy the domestic market." hou yinglan also have confidence.
related links
selection of glass from amorphous silicon thin film solar
at present, amorphous silicon thin film solar cells are low cost, easy to obtain raw materials, the weak light can also generate electricity (crystalline silicon solar cells can only power in the light), while the future building materials integrated solar panels (bipv) need battery light, and crystalline silicon solar cells can not light, to promote the rapid development of thin-film solar cells, but amorphous silicon thin film solar cell conversion efficiency is only 5% -8%, compared with 16% of crystalline silicon solar cells have a greater difference , while the amorphous silicon thin film solar cell light stability of the problem, that is, in the battery long-term strong light irradiation, the conversion efficiency will reduce the light degradation phenomenon. therefore, microcrystalline silicon solar cells began to develop, microcrystalline silicon spectral absorption of a wide range, but also less prone to light deterioration effect of the advantages of amorphous silicon thin film solar cells to form two (tanden) or multi-layer junction of solar cells, conversion efficiency can be raised to 10% -12%. tanden type amorphous silicon thin film solar energy than crystalline silicon solar cells have a better price for the future development of the mainstream.
