Solar Junction says it has achieved an NREL-confirmed record 43.5% efficiency on a commercial-ready concentrated PV production cell, and reiterated plans to scale in-house capacity to 250MW and ship commercial cells this year.

April 14, 2011 - Solar Junction says it has achieved an NREL-confirmed record 43.5% efficiency on a commercial-ready (5.5mm × 5.5mm) concentrated PV production cell, beating the previous mark by 1.2%. Peak efficiency was measured at >400 suns, and maintained efficiency as high as 43% at 1000 suns.

The company is working on high-efficiency multijunction cells, using a proprietary "adjustable spectrum lattice-matched" -- dubbed "A-Slam" -- that more optimally partitions the solar spectrum to maximize efficiency and reliability. Two months ago it produced a NREL-verified 41.4% efficient cell. Both efforts fall under the US DoE's PV Incubator program. The company says it plans to scale in-house manufacturing capacity to 250MW and ship commercial cells "within the year."

"There's no question that we've been on a nine-month tear," stated said Jim Weldon, CEO of Solar Junction. "With A-SLAM, we have a highly extensible technology that is actually delivering a clear and continued path to higher efficiencies in both the short and long term. That bodes well for CPV."