How amorphous solar cells can produce more energy at lower costs
Amorphous solar cells
One of the biggest challenges for solar panel producers is to make the cells efficient yet cost effective. The more energy that can be yielded from solar cells, then the more it drives down costs and makes solar power a more attractive and affordable energy source for companies and governments.
Therein lies the appeal of amorphous solar cells. Currently crystalline silicon is used in standard silicon solar cells, which increases the production costs quite significantly. However the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands is engaging in research to increase the efficiency of solar cells by up to nine percent by utilizing amorphous silicon. By using this instead of crystalline silicon, production costs are much lower while the cells 
become more efficient.
However there are drawbacks to amorphous solar cells – currently, they do not have as high a yield as the cells that use crystalline silicon. While it is more expensive, crystalline silicon has a comparative yield of about 18 percent compared to the (current) seven percent of the amorphous silicon cells. If amorphous cells are to take off, they their yield needs to drastically increase
The reason behind their current low yield, and what scientists are attempting to change, is the Staebler-Wronski effect which reduces solar panel’s ability to produce energy from 10 percent to seven in the very first hours of sun exposure.
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