SUNDRIVE SOLAR
UNSW SPINOUT
The solar PV industry relies heavily on silver for solar cell electrodes. Silver is both expensive and limited in supply( 20 per cent of the world’ s industrial silver consumption is attributed to solar cell manufacturing).
With mainstream PV technology at its limits, the industry is rapidly pursuing next-generation PV technologies to meet increasing energy demands but these require up to three times more silver. This further constrains the expansion potential of solar PV.
SunDrive is developing a copper plating technology to replace silver as the solar cell electrode. Copper is 100 times cheaper per kilogram and a thousand times more abundant. More importantly, SunDrive’ s technology can provide performance boosts unachievable with current silver-based technologies.
> Developed world-first direct copper plating for next-generation solar PV.
> Solar cell efficiency world record( 25.54 %) in September 2021.
> Successful translation of cell technology to early demonstration modules.
> Demonstration of metallisation process on in-house prototype production equipment.
100 INNOVATIONS AND CAPABILITIES
SunDrive has demonstrated its technology on commercial-size cells and demonstration modules. It is now scaling its novel metallisation technology to pilot-scale manufacturing, in preparation for market entry. • 29