High band gap solar cells for underwater Photovoltaic applications

Author

Jenkins, Phillip ; Messenger, Scott ; Trautz, Kelly ; Maximenko, Sergey ; Goldstein, David ; Scheiman, David ; Walters, Robert

Author_Institution

Naval Res. Lab., Washington, DC, USA

fYear

2012

fDate

3-8 June 2012

Abstract

The use of autonomous systems to provide situational awareness and long-term environment monitoring is increasing. Photovoltaics (PV) has been favored as a long-endurance power source for many of these applications. To date the use of PV has been limited to space and terrestrial (dry land) installations. The need for an extended power source also exists for underwater (UW) systems, which currently rely on surface PV arrays or batteries. In this paper we demonstrate that high band gap InGaP solar cells can provide useful power underwater.

Keywords

III-V semiconductors; gallium compounds; indium compounds; marine power systems; solar cells; InGaP; autonomous systems; batteries; extended power source; high band gap solar cells; long-endurance power source; long-term environment monitoring; situational awareness; space installations; surface PV arrays; terrestrial installations; underwater photovoltaic applications; underwater systems; Lighting; Payloads; Photonic band gap; Photovoltaic cells; Photovoltaic systems; Silicon; Temperature measurement; III–V semiconductor materials; photovoltaic cell; spectral shape; underwater technology;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Photovoltaic Specialists Conference (PVSC), 2012 38th IEEE

Conference_Location

Austin, TX

ISSN

0160-8371

Print_ISBN

978-1-4673-0064-3

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/PVSC.2012.6318004

Filename

6318004