Efficiency Band >22% to 22.5%: A Gateway For Advanced Solar Technologies

The TaiyangNews TOP SOLAR MODULES Analysis Report 2024 categorized module efficiency into 4 distinct bands: >22.5%, 22%–22.5%, 21.7%–22%, and 21.5%–21.7%. Our previous article, Growth of >22.5% Efficiency Band in TOP SOLAR MODULES, focused on the >22.5% band. This article explores the details of the second efficiency band: 22%–22.5%. One could call this the gateway efficiency band, especially for TOPCon and HJT technology, more so for the latter. It is also the band that saw the highest growth in 2023 when more and more companies started commercial activities with TOPCon. While product representation in this efficiency range increased from 24% to 36% in 2023, it dipped to 30% by 2024-end. Split year-wise, starting at a share of 36% at the beginning of 2024, this efficiency band saw a consistent decrease to 30% by the end of the year. This was driven by the number of products decreasing from 20 to 16 – reducing by 1 every 3 months in the first half, then by 1 in the 4 months after that, and again by 1 in the last 2 months of the year. In contrast, the year 2023 saw a considerable rise in both the number of products as well as their share, with the latter going from 24% in January to 36% in December, corresponding to a product count of 8 and 20, respectively.

Regarding the development efforts from different companies in this efficiency band in 2024, in January, DMEGC’s latest TOPCon product reached the top efficiency of this band, 22.5% from 22.45%, before moving on to the next band in April. In February, Tongwei increased the efficiency of its TOPCon module, moving out of this band altogether. In the same month, Qcells joined our listing with an efficiency of 22.3%, which remained at this level until year-end. In March, Türkiye's Kalyon was included in our list for the first time with a TOPCon module of 22.38% efficiency. In April, DMEGC once again improved the efficiency of its TOPCon product beyond 22.5%, leaving this group. In May, EGing PV improved its TOPCon product efficiency from22.45% to 22.5%, and continued at this level till year-end. In July, JA Solar and REC improved their TOPCon and HJT module efficiencies beyond 22.5%to mark their exit from this group. Another company to move up was SolarSpace in November, increasing the efficiency of its TOPCon modules to 22.65% (See Tracking Efficiency Improvements In Solar Modules).

While there were no changes in the first 2 months of 2023, there were several in the subsequent months. In March, Tongwei started offering its TOPCon modules in the commercial space with an efficiency of 22.4%, the same as that of JA Solar’s product. Astronergy also increased the efficiency of its product from 22.1% to 22.4%. Then, 3 companies jumped to the highest efficiency of this band at 22.5% – JA Solar and Tongwei in April and Astronergy in May. However, Astronergy moved up from this band in September.

In addition to its already-listed HJT product with 22.5% efficiency, Canadian Solar also introduced a TOPCon module with 22.3% efficiency in March, which it subsequently improved to 22.5% in May to match its HJT offering. However, the above illustration fails to reflect this entirely. As for the first 2 companions of Canadian Solar’s 22.3% efficiency TOPCon product at the time, while REC had been at this level throughout the year, SPIC moved up from this band in September with a higher efficiency product. DAS Solar also improved the efficiency of its TOPCon product in March, from 22.1% to 22.3%, then again to 22.5%, where it stayed till the end of the year. Trinasolar started offering a 22.3% TOPCon module in April; however, its predecessor, with an efficiency of 21.9%, was not part of this efficiency band, giving the impression that the product is new. The company once again improved the top efficiency of its TOPCon offering in June to 22.5%, which was its last update for the year. In June, Risen commercialized its HJT module with 22.5% efficiency, which remained unaltered for the rest of the year. In June 2023, DMEGC entered our listing for the first time with a 22.4% efficiency module, which improved to 22.45% in the very next month, which also remained unchanged till the end of the year (see Efficiency Trends And Technology Shifts In TOP SOLAR MODULES).

A major change to occur in July 2023 was 6 new companies entering the TOP SOLAR MODULES list, of which products from 4 companies belonged to this efficiency band. Qn-SOLAR with its 22.45% efficiency module, Runergy and Suntech with 22.4%, and SolarSpace with its 22.02% module were the 4 companies. Of these, while products from Suntech and Qn-SOLAR remained at the same efficiency level, both SolarSpace and Runergy improved the top TOPCon efficiencies in December – the former to 22.45% and the latter to 22.5%. Seemingly a sweet spot, the 22.5% efficiency level was shared by as many as 8 products by December. Also in July, EGing PV, which was at 22.05% since August 2022, commercialized a 22.44% product, which it improved again to 22.45% the next month to stay there for the rest of the year.

In August, 2 more companies – URECO and GCL SI – joined in with 2 products from the former and 1 from the latter. Both featuring for the first time, URECO’s products feature higher efficiencies among these. Its TOPCon product is rated at 22.45%, while the HJT module falls short by just 0.01% with a labeled efficiency of 22.44%. These products maintained the status quo for the test of the year. GCL SI’s TOPCon module entered our list with 22.3% efficiency and remained at that level until the end of 2023. In October, Yingli and CECEP joined the group with their TOPCon products featuring respective efficiencies of 22.36% and 22.1%, and remained there for the remaining next 2 months of the year. In December 2023, Akcome improved the efficiency of its HJT module from the 22.22% level to 22.37% (see Top 3 Solar Module Efficiencies In 2023/2024).

The TaiyangNews TOP SOLAR MODULES 2024 Report summarizes the key findings from over 24 editions published during 2023 and 2024. Download the free report here.