Course Outline:
- General Introduction, “What is Photovoltaics?” Solar energy resource, current use of PV
- Introduction to the physics of crystalline semiconductors: band structure, intrinsic and extrinsic semiconductors, quasi-Fermi levels.
- Transport phenomena in semiconductors, recombination, the p-n junction. The photovoltaic effect
- Material junctions and energy band-diagrams. Metal/semiconductor contacts. Heterojunctions
- Optical absorption, solar spectrum and EQE. Solar cell efficiency limits. Equivalent circuit model.
- Crystalline silicon (c-Si) PV technology and operation. Basic and high efficiency c-Si cell architectures.
- PV technology overview and the cost of PV
- Modules, concentration, and advanced concepts
Niveau requis :
Recommended courses for Ecole polytechnique students :
PHY430 - Advanced Quantum Physics and PHY433 - Statistical Physics
Course Language : English
ECTS Credits : 5
- Teaching coordinator: Delamarre Amaury
- Teaching coordinator: Johnson Erik
- Teaching coordinator: Novikova Tatiana