Solar PV: A predominant strategy for energy storage

Industry leaders and research analysts unfold the upcoming trends and opportunities to boost the application of solar PV modules and ways to prevail over potential challenges to achieve the desired results.

The solar energy sector in India has grown exponentially in the past decade and there are several technological advancements that have been implemented by the industry. Since solar energy is the cheapest and most affordable source of energy for power extraction and conservation, it is placed as a most popular in renewable energy across the world. Solar PV modules are an important market, and developing it is crucial to achieve the targets set by the government for solar energy in India.

Technological developments in solar PV modules
The government’s plan to increase India’s renewable energy generation capacity to 175 GW by 2022 has increased the share of renewable energy by more than 50 percent in terms of both installed capacity as well as energy generation in the last five years. With respect to the ongoing advancements in the renewable energy sector, Honey Shah, Director, Peco Industries says, “Giving away government subsidiaries and adopting solar by installing solar PV in our surroundings seems to be the only alternative. PV can be maintained and managed by the owner themselves. The government can push for adoption of the same for residential and industrial uses; then it could be pushed up because surely it should be compulsory in the coming time.”

Energy can be saved by installing solar PV modules, for which the solar energy sector has been leveraging technology across various platforms. CV Ramanan, Solar Product Unit Head, Thermax Limited says, “PERC cell technology has become pervasive now, and mono cells are also gaining traction. Apart from this, cut cells and bi-facials are gaining traction for their increased efficiency. Module capacity is going up now from what it was earlier. Thus, power density has increased with modern PV technologies.” In terms of new technologies, we are seeing hybrid cells entering the commercial market.

Challenges faced by solar PV module sector
In the last five years, imports of solar PV cells and modules were about three times the cumulative Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) of India at $4.83 billion that flowed into the entire renewable energy sector. Most importantly, the installation cost of utility-scale solar PV in the country has declined by 84.2 percent between 2010 and 2018, making India the world’s topmost country in achieving the lowest installation cost for utility-scale solar PV.

Explaining the end user’s perspective, Gurpreet Singh Walia, Vice President, Gensol Group of Companies said, “We feel that solar PV module R&D efforts from the industry are commendable, but new technology adoption rate gets largely restricted with lack of technology provability backed by data, something that most of the leading companies fail to provide early on and proactively. Given the policy and economic circumstances prevailing in the country coupled with the rate at which assets are exchanging hands, risk aversion is at its peak and demonstrable performance would trump glorious numbers.”

Manoj Gupta, VP-Solar and Waste to Energy Business, Fortum India Pvt Ltd, said, “One of the most predominant strategies, and the furthest along in development and implementation, is energy storage. This technology aims to store the excess energy created by the solar panels for later use when the sun is not shining. Currently, the technology is too expensive to be implemented on a large scale. Another development that we are keenly looking at is blockchain using quantum computing, machine learning, and artificial intelligence technologies that can potentially drive economic activity and growth to a great extent.”

Industry perspective
A recent report by renewable energy consulting firm Bridge to India (BTI) said that the solar photovoltaic (PV) panel waste volume in India is estimated to grow to 2,00,000 tonnes by 2030 and around 1.8 million tonnes by 2050 — almost 200 times the weight of the Eiffel Tower. Gupta said, “A big challenge that we face is that solar PV deployment is quite land-intensive, and scaling up project sizes requires large chunks of contiguous land parcels, which becomes challenging in many situations. Alternatives such as floating solar PV (FSPV) or floatovoltaics is one such alternative which has started getting traction worldwide and is expected to grow strongly over the coming years in India as well.”

Also, there are developments taking place for better management of solar waste. Solar PV modules are difficult to recycle and are a hazard to the environment when no longer viable. Globally, renewable power giants are working on waste-to-energy initiatives with the objective of producing energy from industrial waste and reducing the environmental damage caused by untreated solar waste.

Suggestive measures for efficacious application
It is evident that demand for electricity is on a rising spree, and a lot of companies are now shifting towards renewable energy. And, notably, with the government promoting renewable energy across the sector, manufacturers seem to be interested in installing solar PV modules for their own power consumption. With respect to research and development in the solar PV module segment, Shah states, “Research is an ongoing process while we progressively work. Moreover, Peco is looking forward to enter the DC MCB segment. We are going for photovoltaic application in products such as DC MCB and surge protection device. They are basic products which are used in solar panels. Maybe in one or two months, we’ll be launching DC MCBs.”

Interestingly, researchers at MIT and at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) have recently outlined a pathway to slash costs by slimming down silicon cells. The findings are detailed in a paper in the journal Energy and Environmental Science, co-authored by MIT postdoc Zhe Liu, professor of mechanical engineering Tonio Buonassisi, and five others at MIT and NREL. The researchers describe their approach as “technoeconomic”, stressing that at this point economic considerations are as crucial as the technological ones in achieving further improvements in affordability of solar panels.

According to renewable energy analyst Gregory Wilson of Gregory Wilson Consulting, the impact of reducing the amount of silicon used in mainstream cells would be very significant. The most obvious gain is in the total amount of capital required to scale the PV industry to the multi-terawatt scale required by the climate change problem. Another benefit is in the amount of energy required to produce silicon PV panels. This is because the polysilicon production and ingot growth processes that are required for the production of high efficiency cells are very energy-intensive.

Gurpreet Singh Walia, Vice President, Gensol Group of Companies
Solar PV module R&D efforts from the industry are commendable, but new technology adoption rate gets largely restricted with lack of technology provability backed by data.

Manoj Gupta, VP-Solar and Waste to Energy Business, Fortum India Pvt Ltd
Alternatives such as floating solar PV (FSPV) or floatovoltaics is one such alternative which has started getting traction worldwide and is expected to grow strongly over the coming years in India as well.

Honey Shah, Director, Peco Industries
Giving away government subsidiaries and adopting solar by installing solar PV in our surroundings seems to be the only alternative.

CV Ramanan, Solar Product Unit Head, Thermax Limited
Module capacity is going up now from what it was earlier. Thus, power density has increased with modern PV technologies.