A miniature solar device for overall water splitting consisting of series-connected spherical silicon solar cells
Type
ArticleAuthors
Kageshima, YosukeShinagawa, Tatsuya

Kuwata, Takaaki
Nakata, Josuke
Minegishi, Tsutomu
Takanabe, Kazuhiro

Domen, Kazunari
KAUST Department
Catalysis for Energy Conversion (CatEC)Chemical Science Program
KAUST Catalysis Center (KCC)
Physical Science and Engineering (PSE) Division
Date
2016-04-18Online Publication Date
2016-04-18Print Publication Date
2016-07Permanent link to this record
http://hdl.handle.net/10754/605858
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
A novel “photovoltaics (PV) + electrolyzer” concept is presented using a simple, small, and completely stand-alone non-biased device for solar-driven overall water splitting. Three or four spherical-shaped p-n junction silicon balls were successfully connected in series, named “SPHELAR.” SPHELAR possessed small projected areas of 0.20 (3PVs) and 0.26 cm2 (4PVs) and exhibited working voltages sufficient for water electrolysis. Impacts of the configuration on the PV module performance were carefully analyzed, revealing that a drastic increase in the photocurrent (≈20%) was attained by the effective utilization of a reflective sheet. Separate investigations on the electrocatalyst performance showed that non-noble metal based materials with reasonably small sizes (<0.80 cm2) exhibited substantial currents at the PV working voltage. By combining the observations of the PV characteristics, light management and electrocatalyst performance, solar-driven overall water splitting was readily achieved, reaching solar-to-hydrogen efficiencies of 7.4% (3PVs) and 6.4% (4PVs).Citation
A miniature solar device for overall water splitting consisting of series-connected spherical silicon solar cells 2016, 6:24633 Scientific ReportsSponsors
This work was financially supported by Grants-in-Aid for Specially Promoted Research (No. 23000009) of Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS).Publisher
Springer NatureJournal
Scientific ReportsPubMed ID
27087266Additional Links
http://www.nature.com/articles/srep24633ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1038/srep24633
Scopus Count
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