SUNLAB is going to PVSC!

We are very happy to announce that all of the abstracts submitted by SUNLAB have been accepted for oral or poster presentation at the 42nd IEEE Photovoltaic Specialists Conference PVSC taking place in June 14-19, 2015, in New Orleans. PVSC is one of the largest solar energy conferences in the world, bringing together researchers, students, scientists, engineers, technology and business leaders from industry, academia from all over the world to discuss the recent advances in PV and future challenges we need to face as a community to widespread solar electricity to the benefit of all.The work that is going to be presented by SUNLAB members:

• "Optimization of a four junction solar cell CPV system using ray tracing and SPICE modeling" by Pratibha Sharma, Matthew Wilkins, Henry Schriemer and Karin Hinzer - oral presentation
• "Optimization of GaAs nanowire solar cell efficiency via optoelectronic modeling" by Anna H. Trojnar, Christopher E. Valdivia, Azizur Rahman, Ray R. LaPierre, Karin Hinzer and Jacob J. Krich - oral presentation
• "Refractive Concentrator Optics Architectures, Tracker Precision, and Cumulative Energy Harvest" by John P. D. Cook, Pratibha Sharma, Lianne de la Salle, Fred Carle, Patrick M. White, Viktar Tatsiankou, Joan E. Haysom, Elena Dragomirescu, Henry Schriemer and Karin Hinzer - oral presentation
• "A novel instrument for cost-effective and reliable measurement of solar spectral irradiance" by Viktar Tatsiankou, Karin Hinzer, Henry Schriemer, Joan Haysom, and Richard Beal- oral presentation
• "Identifying reoresentative spectra for which multi-junction solar cells should be optimized to maximize annual energy yield by Mark D. Yandt, Karin Hinzer, and Henry Schriemer - poster presentation

SUNLAB at CPV-11

We are very happy to announce that all our abstracts submitted to the 11th International Conference on Concentrator Photovoltaics (CPV-11) have been accepted! CPV-11 takes place this year in April 13-15th, 2015 in Aix-Bains, France. Here is a list of our abstracts:

• "Towards CPV systems using dilute nitride-containing 4-junction solar cells by Christopher E. Valdivia, Matthew M. Wilkins, Ross Cheriton, Pratibha Sharma, Anna H. Trojnar, Gitanjali Kolhatkar, Abderraouf Boucherif, Abdelatif Jaouad, Simon Fafard, Vincent Aimez, Richard Ares, and Karin Hinzer - poster presentation
• "Effects of nonuniform ilumination on tripple junction solar cells under concentration" by Patrick M. White, Pratibha Sharma, Pierre Besson, Mathieu Baudrit, Simon Fafard, Henry Schriemer, and Karin Hinzer - poster presentation
• "Multijunction solar cell analysis with the tunable automated subcell characterization unit" by Patrick M. White, Christopher R. Valdivia, Mark Yandt, Simon Fafard, Karin Hinzer, and Henry Schriemer - poster presentation
• "Next Generation Solar Spectral Irradiance Meter with Enhanced Reliability" by Viktar Tatsiankou, Karin Hinzer, Joan E. Haysom, Henry Schriemer, and Richard Beal - oral presentation

NREL PV reliability workshop

John Cook, a senior researcher at SUNLAB, attended the NREL PV reliability workshop (February 24-27) in Golden, CO, where he presented on behalf of Viktar Tatsiankou, PhD student at SUNLAB, the summary of the SSIM performance during one week of testing at NREL outdoor test facility. The poster can be found here.

Report on the Status of Concentrator Photovoltaics by Fraunhofer ISE and NREL

The two largest solar energy research centers worldwide, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, NREL (US), and Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE (Germany) have compiled a report titled "Current Status of Concentrator Photovoltaic (CPV) Technology" describing the status of both the current market and its future perspectives as well as the state-of-the-art for concentrator photovoltaic research and technology. This study is published on the websites of NREL and Fraunhofer ISE .

CMC Microsystem growth funding awards for SUNLAB!

SUNLAB has been granted funding from Canadian Microelectonics Corporation (CMC) to develop a four-junction solar cell using InGaAsN(Sb) dilute nitride material. This project builds on previous work with single-junction dilute nitride solar cells. The first stage of the project has been completed, yielding a series of wafer templates with germanium bottom sub-cells and epitaxially grown tunnel junctions, which will form the basis for growth of complete four-junction devices.

The Solar Spectral Irradiance Meters (SSIM) calibrated at NREL

Viktar Tatsiankou, PhD Student in Electrical Engineering, has successfully deployed the Solar Spectral Irradiance Meters (SSIM) at National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) during November 15-22 trip to Golden, Colorado. Viktar, working closely with NREL's senior scientist Keith Emery, was able to compare the performance of two next generation SSIMs from COFOVO Energy against the state-of-the-art spectroradiometers, the pyrheliometers and the absolute cavity radiometer. The SSIMs were able to match aforementioned instruments with a great accuracy, the example of which is demonstrated in the figure below, where the SSIM's direct normal irradiance is within 0.5% of the Kipp and Zonen's model CH1 pyrheliometer.  

Ottawa Entrepreneurship Scholarship for Viktar Tatsiankou

PhD Student in Electrical Engineering, Viktar Tatsiankou, received University of Ottawa Entrepreneurship Scholarship for demonstration of the Solar Spectral Irradiance Meter (SSIM) capabilities. SSIM, designed by Viktar, allows to accurately resolve the solar spectrum at a fraction of the cost of traditional spectroradiometric approaches.

L’énergie sur le campus

Le samedi 4 octobre , l'uOttawa prendra part à l’initiative Green Energy Doors Open initiative , un salon consacré aux projets d’énergie renouvelable, organisé annuellement par la Ontario Sustainable Energy Association dans plusieurs villes de la province.Activités :Stands interactifsExpériences pratiques et courses de voitures solairesVisites des laboratoires intérieurs du SUNLAB et du centre de recherche solaire extérieureVisites de la centrale thermiqueVenez découvrir les projets d’énergie renouvelable menés par des chercheurs et des opérateurs de l’uOttawa.More information can be found here

Energy on Campus: Green Energy Doors Open

On Saturday, October 4, 2014, uOttawa will take part in the Green Energy Doors Open initiative , which is a single-day, province-wide annual showcase of sustainable energy projects sponsored by the Ontario Sustainable Energy Association (OSEA).ActivitiesInteractive boothsHands-on experiments and solar car racesTours of SunLab’s indoor labs and outdoor solar test siteTours of uOttawa’s power plantDrop in to learn about the exciting sustainable energy projects that uOttawa researchers and operators are conducting.More information can be found here

1st Prize in the uOttawa SPIE Elevator Pitch Competition

Congratulations to Ross Cheriton, PhD student at SUNLAB on winning 1st Prize in the uOttawa SPIE Elevator Pitch Competition held on June 4th at the University of Ottawa.Ross was presenting 5 minute pitch entitled "Sunstack: An independent energy solution".

Visit by Korea Advanced Nano-fab Center

The SUNLAB was pleased to welcome a visit by Dr. Won-Kyu Park, Vice-President & Head of Device Technology Division of the Korea Advanced Nano-fab Center (KANC), located in the Gwang-Gyo Techno Valley of Gyeonggi-Do province outside Seoul, Korea.

Nomination for Best Student Paper, PVSC40

Congratulations to Matt Wilkins, PhD student at SUNLAB on his nomination for the Best Student Paper Award for his submission to the 40th IEEE Photovoltaics Specialists Conference (PVSC) to be held in Denver, Colorado, in June 2014. His presentation is entitled "Effects of Luminescent Coupling in Single- and 4-Junction Dilute Nitride Solar Cells". His model will be applied to single and 4-junction dilute nitride solar cells and the influence of the physical phenomena will be analyzed. The recipient of the award will be announced at the conference.

PEO Ottawa Chapter Student Paper Night

Suppported by the SUNLAB, 4th year University of Ottawa Electrical Engineering students, Normand Amyotte, Michael Kelly, Robert Li, Patrick McVey, received The Best Technical Content Award at the annual PEO Ottawa Chapter Student Paper Night, help at Salon San Marco on April 8, 2014. The title of their project was Multi Junction Solar Cell Characterisation Instrument.

CMC Microsystems Award for growth funding

SUNLAB has received three awards of funding from CMC Microsystems to grow prototype dilute nitride solar cells which will be used to advance the design of 3- and 4-junction solar cells. Those growths were awarded in October 2013, February and March 2014 and are now in progress.

IEEE Ottawa Photonics North 2013 award

Viktar Tatsiankou, master student in the SUNLAB, was the recipient of a 2nd place Student Best Paper award at the 2013 IEEE Ottawa Photonics North by for his proceedings entitled "Reconstruction of solar spectral resource using limited spectral sampling for concentrating photovoltaic systems".The paper presented a method of limited spectral sampling with a simulated multi-channel filter radiometer (MCFR) to reconstruct incident solar spectra.

Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP)

Congratulations to Frédéric Bouchard for his Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP) Award for the fall session 2012!UROP provides undergraduate students with unique and exciting opportunities to explore cutting-edge research at the University of Ottawa while they define their professional goals.

First Canadian Photovoltaics Graduate School

Funded by the NSERC Photovoltaic Innovation Network and Mitacs, the First Canadian Photovoltaics Graduate School aims to attract graduate students and postdoctoral fellows from across Canada to take part in an intensive three-day training event at the University of Ottawa from May 16 to 18, 2012 in Ottawa, Ontario. See the details on the First Canadian Photovoltaics Graduate School webpage.

NREL reliability workshop poster prize

Richard Beal, SUNLAB's PhD Fellow, was awarded a prize for his poster at the 2012 Photovoltaic Module Reliability Workshop (PVMRW) that was held at NREL in Golden, Colorado, February 28-March 1, 2012.The poster entitled High Intensity Light-Cycling and Early-Life Failure Detection for HCPV Cell Assemblies Using the XT-30 Solar Simulator presented information on SUNLAB's indoor reliability testing on highly-concentrating photovoltaic systems with the in-house high concentration continuous-wave solar simulator.The proceedings can now be found here .

$1.7M for University of Ottawa research projects to make a better, brighter Canada of tomorrow

Dr. Karin Hinzer was one of the five University of Ottawa scientists who have been awarded a total of $1.7 million from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) in support of high impact research projects that will generate benefits to the country's economic, social and environmental landscape over the next ten years.The SUNLAB's project called 4CPV will study materials and processes for quad-junction concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) solar cells with conversion efficiencies in the 45%-50% range, grown by chemical beam epitaxy. This project is in collaboration with Cyrium Technologies from the private sector and the University of Sherbrooke. Read more from the University of Ottawa news. Pour en savoir plus, suivez le lien sur le site de l'Université d'Ottawa.

APECS - Advancing Photovoltaics for Economical Concentrator Systems project

The APECS project goal is to establish high-efficiency concentration photovoltaic (CPV) systems as an economically viable technology for grid-connected solar power generation in Ontario, Canada, and globally. This is a $10M Ontario Research Foundation – Research Excellence funded program with three partners: Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation, the University of Ottawa and Morgan Solar Inc.