Origin Energy fund innovation in advanced solar cells

Origin Energy is an energy company with a pilot production facility in South Australia set up to develop and manufacture advanced solar cells using SLIVER Cell technology.

This award-winning SLIVER technology was invented and developed at the Australian National University’s Centre for Sustainable Energy Systems with financial support from Origin Energy. SLIVER cells are substantially thinner than most solar cells yet highly efficient, while using a lot less silicon.

Several of the processes used in the manufacture of SLIVER Cells have been significantly fine-tuned using information generated by high-resolution scanning electron microscopy using Microscopy Australia’s flagship instrument at the University of Adelaide. It has enabled the team at Origin Energy to prepare and analyse specific sites on production samples, allowing them to better understand details of the device structure at the nano-scale. The engineers have used this knowledge to fast-track the development process, providing significant cost savings and helping to advance the development of SLIVER technology to the market phase.