H2Demo

Development of demonstrators for direct solar water splitting

 

Contact person

Prof. Thomas Hannappel
Group for Fundamentals of Energy Materials

Phone: +49 3677 69-2566
e-mail:thomas.hannappel@tu-ilmenau.de

Funding information

Funding source: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF)

Project leader:Projektträger Jülich GmbH (PTJ)

Project number:03SF0619I

Participating groups: Group for Fundamentals of Energy Materials

Period of funding: 01.03.2021 - 28.02.2026

Project information

Illustration of the scalable demonstrator module based on III-V/Si tandem absorbers for direct splitting of water to hydrogen and oxygen utilizing solar energy, which should achieve a conversion efficiency of at least 15%.

The aim of the overall project is to develop demonstrators with an area of 1300 cm^2 for direct solar hydrogen production with an efficiency > 15 %. The focus of the sub-project of TU lmenau in H2Demo is on the improvement of III-V-on-Si heteroepitaxy and the development and application of analytical methods. Specifically, the preparation and detection of III-V nucleation layers on Si(001) with significantly reduced defect density are to be carried out at the TU Ilmenau, and the effect of different defects arising at the interface on the electronic properties of the layers is to be investigated. The developed processes are to be transferred to Fraunhofer ISE. The TU Ilmenau is supporting the start-up of the high-throughput process in the second phase with process development and analysis. In analytics, the TU Ilmenau provides measurement technology in the field of charge carrier lifetime measurement and develops novel in situ and operando measurement technology for the analysis of surface properties and charge carrier dynamics as well as performance characteristics in the environment of the photoelectrochemical cell.