A triple-cell concentrator PV system with no current-matching and no lattice-matching constrains

Abstract

In this work, we propose a PV system that enables the operation of three solar cells independently. It also allows the use of low-cost semiconductors like Si and Ge. The system splits the solar spectrum into two bands and directs the resulting beams towards two separate receivers. Splitting the spectrum is achieved by using multilayer optical filters. The system is optimized for incorporating three solar cells made of GaAs, Si and Ge. After looking at the beam-splitting PV systems reported in the literature, we noticed that only one configuration was investigated among several possible configurations. In this paper we look at 12 possible configurations and study how different methods for placing the PV cells in a beam-splitting system affect their response. The modeling results showed that the efficiency of the system varied by up to 2.76% when the solar cells were placed at the two receivers in different fashions. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2012.