China's Longi Solar claims PERC cell energy efficiency record
Chinese solar panel maker Longi Solar said it has set a record for the efficiency of a bifacial solar cell. Test results on its product, called a bifacial passivated emitter rear contact (PERC) cell, were backed by China’s National Center of Supervision and Inspection on Solar Photovoltaic Products Quality. Longi said the rear side of its bifacial module achieved 82.15% of the front side, compared with an industry standard of about 75%.
Chinese solar manufacturer Longi Solar announced it has achieved an 82.15% bifaciality world record for its bifacial PERC monocrystalline cell, dubbed Hi-MO2. The company said the result was confirmed by China’s National Center of Supervision and Inspection on Solar Photovoltaic Products Quality (CPVT).

Bifaciality is commonly defined as the ratio of the output measured from the rearside of a cell over the output measured from its front side. According to Longi, the bifaciality of standard bifacial PERC solar in the market is currently around 75%.

Longi further said its bifacial PERC cell, in mass production, has a conversion efficiency of around 21.2%. “If the backside power yield increases the overall module efficiency by 10%, the power of bifacial PERC module can reach 330 watts for 60-cell module (300 watts from the front side), and 396 watts for 72-cell module (360 watts from the front side),” the company asserted in a statement released.

The company also claims that it offers more resistance to PID thanks to its double glass lamination, and that its average annual degradation is below 0.45% for 30 years and under 2% in the first year of its lifetime.

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In late October, Longi announced a 22.71% efficiency for its monocrystalline passivated emitter rear contact (PERC) solar cells. The company will start manufacturing its 22.0% PERC cells by the end 2017.

It expects its module power rating to be between 340 W and 345 W for a 60-cell panel format, and its PERC cell to surpass a conversion efficiency of 23.0% at some point in the “near future.”