This report illustrates the activities carried out and the results achieved in 2019 within the project 1.1 High Efficiency Photovoltaics .

The aim of the project is to facilitate the development of high-efficient and low-cost photovoltaic (PV) generation systems, also making a contribution to optimize the production of the plants installed in the Italian territory; this is to achieve the objectives of the integrated NECP for 2030, which envisage a PV power of 50 GW and an annual production of 72 TWh, while providing technological support to companies to consistently participate in this phase of PV technology development.

In WP1 “Concentrated Solar Photovoltaics”, the completed activities have concerned the optimization of diagnostic techniques for multi-junction cells, through hardware and software improvements of the system for measuring their spectral response. Solar concentrators based on new compact high-concentration systems and on low-concentration systems with innovative tracking systems that could make them favorable in ” building integrated “ applications (BIPV) have also been preliminarily developed. Finally, following the modeling of Thermophotovoltaic (TPV) microgeneration systems, the efficiency obtainable from the system with Germanium devices has been evaluated at around 10%: this opens up good prospects regarding TPV systems for domestic microgeneration.

In WP 2 “Planned Photovoltaics”, the completed activities have concerned the development of innovative technological solutions for the efficiency of PV systems; diagnostic techniques have been analyzed and faults in operating systems potentially contributing to increasing the production of PV systems and reducing their O&M costs, have been identified/characterized. The functioning of the RSE MPPT algorithm for PV inverters has also been improved and successfully compared with commercial inverters.

Finally, in WP3 “Solar Source and Environment”, the data of Spectral Distribution of Direct Normal Radiation in various sites has been increased and the method for creating DNI maps on the national territory improved, which is essential for identifying suitable sites for CPV plants. Furthermore, LCA studies have been carried out to evaluate the potential environmental impact of a high-efficiency photovoltaic generation technology.