The U.S. Department of Energy has announced over one billion dollars (USD) in loan guarantees to fund the expansion of distributed clean energy systems in America, including $24 million for 11 specialised projects aimed at creating a new class of concentrated solar panel.
The funding will come from the DoE’s Loans Programs Office (LPO) as part of President Barack Obama’s new Clean Power Plan, which mandates U.S. States cut carbon pollution from the power sector by 30 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030.
The LPO was established to help emerging distributed energy technologies such as rooftop photovoltaic (PV) energy systems, wind power plants and energy storage overcome market barriers to investment. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz says the new funding will help accelerate the growth of America’s clean economy.
“The announcements made today will help spur innovative clean energy technologies that will be central to the president’s Clean Power Plan and combat climate change,” said Secretary Moniz. “The Clean Power Plan is a tremendous opportunity for American businesses to be global leaders in solar and distributed energy technologies.”
A specialised program called MOSAIC (Micro-scale Optimized Solar-cell Arrays with Integrated Concentration) will award 11 teams across America $24 million to develop innovations in solar technology to create a new class of highly efficient “flat-plate” rooftop solar panel.
MOSAIC solar panels use thousands of tiny lenses to concentrate light onto an array of PV cells to achieve higher solar-to-electricity conversion. Known as micro-scale concentrated PV, these small rooftop CPV systems produce far more energy than conventional solar modules according to the DoE.
“This micro-CPV approach addresses the constraints of conventional CPV, which, while highly efficient, has not been widely adopted due to its high cost, large size, and expensive solar tracking systems. Project teams will address these limitations by developing innovative materials, micro-scale manufacturing techniques, panel architectures, and tracking schemes.”
Solutions include a solar panel with built-in sun-tracking, such as Panasonic Boston Lab’s system – an array of lenses shifts according to the sun’s movements across the sky, ensuring the panel’s PV cells are always absorbing sunlight.
Another is California Institute of Technology’s new CPV panel for regions of low direct sunlight, which incorporates a luminescent solar concentrator sheet fabricated with quantum dots that enhances energy output by converting the high energy spectrum into light suitable for special wide bandgap micro PV cells sandwiched under the sheet. Additional low bandgap cells convert the remaining low-energy into electricity.
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