Solar Photovoltaic Cells Types & Properties

All of us know that solar photovoltaic cell is a device that converts solar energy to electricity. Also we know that solar cells are integrated together to produce the module and modules are integrated together to produce panels and at the end panels are integrated together to produce the array which represents the final shape of the solar photovoltaic plant that generate electricity to you.

Solar cell is the essential unit of solar photovoltaic system, so you should care about its type and characteristics. The question is If you go around the market, what kind of solar cell you find and what is the pros and cons of each type, let us simply know the answer.

At the market you will find two popular types of solar photovoltaic cell:

Type one: Silicon Wafer also called crystalline silicon cells which represent nearly 93 % of the solar photovoltaic cells present in the market; it is the most famous type. This type is actually categorized into mono crystalline type and poly crystalline type.

Type two: Thin Film which represents nearly 7 % of the solar photovoltaic cells present in the market, this type categorized into amorphous silicon cells (4.2%), cadmium telluride (Cd Te 1 %) cells and copper indium compound cells (CIS 0.7 %).

Now let us now the differences between the main three types:  mono crystalline silicon, poly crystalline silicon and thin film (amorphous):

comparison	Mono crystalline	Poly crystalline	Thin film(amorphous):
Size ratio	Up to 170 w/m2	Up to 150 w/m2	Up to 80 w/m2
Efficiency	Up to 19%	Up to 18%	Up to 10%
life	Long (25 years)	Long (25 years)	short (10 years)
Performance In bad weather	Outstanding performance in cooler weather	Slightly better performance in hotter weather	Outstanding performance in hotter weather and less effective in cooler weather
Common use & Cost	Most commonly used	Less expensive that mono	Cheaper than mono & poly.

The selection of solar photovoltaic cell type is a key actor you should care about when you construct anew solar photovoltaic plant to generate electricity. You should select the most propitiate type according to your load wattage, solar photovoltaic system cost and the environmental condition.