Australian solar researchers win QEPrize for Engineering

Four Australian solar researchers have been awarded the 2023 Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering (QEPrize). The group was recognised for its work at UNSW Sydney to develop Passivated Emitted and Rear Cell (PERC) solar photovoltaic technology, which has underpinned the recent growth in high performance, low-cost solar energy.

The Prize is presented annually to engineers responsible for innovations that have been of global benefit to humanity. Sharing the 2023 Prize are Professor Martin Green from UNSW Sydney, Professor Andrew Blakers from the Australian National University and solar entrepreneurs Dr Aihua Wang and Dr Jianhua Zhao.

Celebrating its 10th year in 2023, the Prize announcement was made in London by Lord Browne of Madingley, Chairman of the QEPrize Foundation. Browne congratulated Green, Blakers, Wang and Zhao for their contribution to humanity. “The QEPrize celebrates the engineers who time and time again solve the impossible and transform our world for the better. I believe that everything we do has to be oriented around the global energy transition so we can achieve net zero, for the planet and the people that live on it. PERC solar cell technology has been and will continue to be integral to this journey,” Browne said.

The 2023 Laureates improved the energy conversion efficiency of commercially dominant silicon cells, by improving the quality of both the top and the rear surface of standard silicon solar cells. When sunlight — in the form of particles called photons — enters a cell, it excites the electrons within the silicon. In this excited state, electrons can move through the cell, creating electric current. The improved surface of the PERC cell allows the electrons to maintain this excited state — or move freely — for longer, resulting in greater and more efficient energy generation.

Green and Blakers produced solar cells with 18% efficiency at UNSW in 1983; over the next two years, the professors published cell results of 19% and 20% efficiency, subsequently achieving over 21% efficiency in 1988 with Wang and Zhao. In 1983, Green had theoretically determined the maximum achievable efficiency to be close to 30% and suggested the maximum practical limit of 25% efficiency, with Wang and Zhao leading the work that ultimately reached this goal in 1999.

Green said he is honoured to share the QEPrize with his three former PhD students Blakers, Wang and Zhao. “As engineers, we are constantly striving to improve the world we live in. As the world feels the devastating impacts of our changing environment and collapsing ecosystems, I feel passionately that we must rapidly reduce our reliance on fossil fuels if we wish to maintain the trajectory of human civilisation on our shared planet. I hope that PERC technology winning the QEPrize will highlight the importance of accelerated solar adoption to address climate change.”

Blakers said the award is an honour for him and for the people he has worked with over the years. “I am delighted to share this prize with Martin Green and Drs Wang and Zhao who have made major contributions to solar energy over many decades,” he said.

Recognising the significant role PERC technology plays in the development of solar energy, the awardees published their findings without patenting, encouraging further developments within the field and driving down the cost of production to the benefit of wider society. Green added that he is proud of the impact of the achievements of many of his former students, including his fellow awardees, have had on the world. “This has not only been in developing new cell technologies like PERC, but also in transforming the solar manufacturing industry by using their expertise to establish manufacturing in low-cost regions of Asia. This is one of the main reasons that solar has suddenly become so cheap over the last decade.”

With the cost of solar energy generation decreasing over the past decade, PERC technology is now among the most commercially viable silicon solar cell technologies used in solar panels and large-scale electricity production. Blakers said he hoped to use his new-found platform as a QEPrize recipient to highlight the importance of accelerated solar adoption to address the threat of global warming. “Solar energy is enormously abundant nearly everywhere. Silicon solar cells allow clean and affordable electrification of energy-poor rural areas across Asia, Africa and the Americas,” Brown said.

The QEPrize Laureates will share £500,000 in prize money and will be honoured at a presentation ceremony in London later this year.

Image credit: iStock.com/SimonSkafar