Commercial Research: Whitfield Solar

Whitfield Solar was set up in 2004 as a vehicle to commercialise 30 years of research by Dr. George Whitfield from the University of Reading into low-cost solar concentrators. He was joined at the Solar Concentrator Group by fellow founders Dr Roger Bentley and Dr Clive Weatherby. A key part of this work was the optimisation of the size of optical elements and concentration ratios used to ensure the most cost-effective PV concentrator systems.

Solar concentration ratios of several thousand times are theoretically possible, but in practice, concentration levels above about 250 times raise a range of technical issues, including the need for:

-Extremely accurate and reliable tracking of the sun to maintain the focused energy on the cell
-Cell technology capable of converting the energy efficiently at this intensity
-A satisfactory means of removing the significant thermal energy absorbed.

The work at Reading looked at the relationship between concentration and cost, and paid attention to the realities and challenges of production.

Whitfield Solar’s launch product competes with flat-plate photovoltaic (PV) offerings on four levels. It is lower cost; lower weight; has lower embodied energy; and requires lower-tech manufacturing processes. Whitfield’s product takes the sun’s energy and concentrates it via an array of Fresnel lenses onto a fraction of the surface area of silicon solar cells that conventional PV panels require. As such it protects its customers from potential shortages of solar silicon and is immune to shortages of solar glass which both threaten the PV industry.

Whilst using tried and tested solar silicon for its launch product, it is set up to embrace new solar cell technology when it has demonstrated the same levels of long-term reliability and cost-efficiency that silicon can deliver.

Whitfield is well-known in the solar community and has had prototypes of its launch product running in Spain for the last 2 years.

By creating a system that relies on a range of highly efficient manufacturing technologies, Whitfield Solar can transfer the benefits of engineering excellence to a CPV product whilst opening the door to the enormous cost savings associated with these high-volume techniques. Unlike many of the alternative concentrator approaches, Whitfield’s core components will be manufactured in multi-million quantities even at quite modest overall power outputs thereby driving significant economies of scale. Perhaps not surprisingly, Whitfield’s development team are drawn from various branches of Europe’s automotive and domestic appliance industries

More information at the Whitfield Solar website.