SiLEAN

Silicon solar cells with Low Environmental footprint and Advanced Interfaces

SiLEAN
SiLEAN
SiLEAN

SiLEAN is an EU project within the Horizon Europe initiative. The main objective is to develop a lean process chain for the next generation of Silicon heterojunction (SHJ) solar cells using epitaxially-grown wafers with lower energy demand, developing alternatives to the highly absorptive hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) for the passivation and carrier-selective contact, developing indium-free contact layers, as well as silver-free metallization concepts, and applying a bismuth-free interconnection. This new type of solar cell will have higher efficiency (>25.5%), lower manufacturing costs (50% cost reduction of Si wafers and 50% cost reduction for both metallization and TCO), and lower environmental impact (up to 75% lower carbon footprint from epitaxial wafers, no or very low amounts of scarce materials thanks to the developed In-, Ag, and Bi-free solar cell technology), as compared to nowadays available crystalline Silicon solar cells. The SiLEAN technology therefore will offer a viable solution enabling TW-scale production. Finally, it will be integrated and demonstrated in SHJ mini modules.

Project partners:

SiLEAN

The SiLEAN project is coordinated by Forschungszentrum Jülich and the consortium comprises an excellent group of partners who have a specific and complementing role within the project, including the value chain in the development of the next generation of SHJ solar modules from industries, RTOs, and scientific research (and for each role hold the adequate resources to reach the objectives of the project). 8 partners will represent SiLEAN: 1 university (TUD), 2 Research and Technology Organisations (FZJ, IMEC), 4 SMEs (UNR, PVWorks, GraphEnergyTech and NEXWAFE) and one industry and engineering partner (3SUN); and coming from 5 European countries (Germany, Belgium, Italy, Switzerland and The Netherlands).

Website:
https://silean.eu/

Last Modified: 02.08.2024