JAPANESE GOVT LAB MAKES BETTER DYE-SENSITIZED SOLAR CELL

The National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology Tuesday announced a way to improve the energy-conversion efficiency of dye-sensitized solar cells.

The institute is working with so-called tandem type dye-sensitized solar cells, which consist of a stack of two layers, one to generate electricity from visible light and one to generate electricity from infrared light.

The agency used a finer powder of titanium oxide to fashion the film that holds the dye. This reduced light scattering and allowed infrared light to pass easier through the first layer down to the second.

With this modification, and another that boosts the voltage of the first layer, the institute was able to achieve a maximum energy efficiency of 11 per cent with its dye-sensitized solar cell, which it said is the highest to date.

(Nikkei)