Research Article
Mallikarjun G. Hudedmani, Vish
Abstract
The current global energy scenario and consumption rate is alarming greatly as the tremendous increase in population causes a sharp increase in electrical energy demand. The exhaustive extraction and production of fossil energy is the main reason and contributor to many environmental issues. As these fuels will ultimately get depleted resulting into increased energy shortfall, climate change and energy insecurity. In this regards every country is putting an effort to increase energy efficiency as well as switching over to new and renewable energy technologies. Among such solar energy from the sun is free and abundant. It offers number of strategic benefits which replaces the fossil-fuel combustion for the various electrical and thermal needs by minimizing the emissions of harmful gases and air pollutants. Currently, solar energy’s contribution to the total global energy supply is very low and small but the potential is enormous. Historically solar systems suffer from huge initial cost than conventional energy sources but once the solar technologies are installed, they have very low operating costs and require minimal input this provides security against conventional fuel supply disruptions and their prices. However present innovation and supports for solar manufacturing and sales prices have dropped greatly from the past few decades resulting into at energy price parity. Shockley-Queisser limit is the theoretical maximum efficiency that a single junction solar cell can exhibit. The current research in this direction is going on to find out the best substitute materials and technology to improve the performance of solar cells. The study of light spectrum and different absorption levels in semiconductor material, special coating, application of nano technology and use of organic polymers have led to greater saving and rapid production.