Part of China's Hanergy Group, US based CIGS technology company MiaSolé has reported a 20.56% solar cell efficiency for a thin-film device measuring 0.86 cm² deposited on a stainless steel foil. The cell efficiency has been confirmed by the US National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), said MiaSolé.
The company used films deposited for the cell from its own Roll Coater production line in Santa Clara, California where it was produced using an 'advanced process that incorporates multiple breakthroughs for delivering alkali elements as well as precise compositional control of the Ag-alloyed CIGS absorber'. MiaSolé says these processes can be directly transferred to high volume manufacturing.
In a brief official statement, MiaSolé's Senior Director of Process Development Dr Neil Mackie said, "Our innovative continuous deposition system enables us to rewrite the process development playbook. By experimenting at the manufacturing scale, we can bring high-efficiency thin-film solar cells into production at a faster rate."
This conversion efficiency comes close on the heels of the company's recent reporting of an aperture area efficiency of 17.44% for a commercial sized PV module, independently confirmed by Germany's Fraunhofer ISE (see Fraunhofer Confirms MiaSolé's 17.44% Efficiency Record).