California-based Amonix, Inc., a manufacturer of concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) systems, recently set a world record with a CPV module that converts over one-third of direct sunlight into electricity in real-world conditions.
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) tested and confirmed that the new Amonix solar module has reached an outdoor efficiency rating of 33.5 percent, with a peak of 34.2 percent.
The figures produced by the company are the highest ever recorded for a concentrator photovoltaic cell in a real-world testing environment, beating the previous record of 30.3 percent, also set by Amonix.
An Amonix installation in Henderson, Nevada. Credit: Amonix
“This is a huge milestone for Amonix and the CPV industry,” said Vahan Garboushian, Amonix Founder and CTO.
“We have been at the forefront of CPV technology breakthroughs and have consistently proven that CPV offers the highest efficiencies of all solar technologies in the right operating conditions with plenty of headroom. Amonix is focused on driving CPV costs down and breaking efficiency records in the near future,” he added.
Other CPV system manufacturers have also claimed to achieve similar high efficiency ratings. Semprius and the US military’s Defense Advanced Research Projects agency both reported 33.9 and 42.8 efficiency ratings respectively. But according to Sarah Kurtz, an NREL scientist, an accredited lab hasn’t verified these claims.
