Student interviews and articles on photovoltaic solar energy

Hydrogen is considered an energy carrier capable of transporting and storing energy for subsequent use in a wide range of applications, from electricity production to transportation and industry. The most common method for hydrogen production today is natural gas reforming, which utilizes methane obtained from a fossil fuel like natural gas, releasing carbon dioxide as […]

Around 95% of the current production of photovoltaic (PV) modules is based on silicon wafers, which need to be extremely pure so that high efficiencies can be achieved when processed as solar cells. Silicon PV technology begins with the carbothermic reduction of quartz in an arc furnace to produce 99%-pure metallurgical silicon. This purity level […]

Name Julia Hernández Ruiz Promotion 2022/2023 Position PhD student Company ICMM-CSIC What is current occupation? I am currently doing my PhD at the Instituto de Ciencia de Materiales de Madrid. In particular, studying hybrid devices of thin films and two-dimensional materials. How has the Master impacted your career? The master’s degree has allowed me to […]

Name Manuel Funes Promotion 2023 Position Technologist Company Aurinka Photovoltaic What is current occupation? The technology department in Aurinka PV is focused on a project aimed to achieve the complete recycling of the photovoltaic modules. The final purpose is reintroducing all de materials in the value chain. I’m contributing to this project in design and […]

The photovoltaic effect refers to the experimental observation of a voltage arising as a result of light shining on a system. The most common observation of this phenomenon occurs in the context of solar cells, where it is used to extract electrical energy from solar energy, and where, because of this, solar cells are also […]

It is fair to say that the first great success of photovoltaic solar energy occurred in outer space. In 1958, the Vanguard I satellite – the third human device put into Earth orbit after Sputnik 1 and 2 – was equipped with modest solar panels covering small parts of its spherical body. This happened despite […]

Name Natalia Fano Promotion 2017/2018 Position Project Engineer Company Enerside Energy What is current occupation? Design and dimensioning of photovoltaic utility-scale power plants. How has the Master impacted your career? Thanks to the master’s degree I have been able to meet important people in the photovoltaic sector in Spain. Above all, it has given me […]

Name Mario Ochoa Promotion 2018 Position Postdoctoral researcher Company Universidad de Cantabria What is current occupation? Researcher in photonics. Specifically on the development of Lab-on-Chip devices and optical fibre sensors. How has the Master impacted your career? Profoundly. The Master’s studies promoted my passion and motivation for science and knowledge and were the starting point […]

Name Mario Martínez Promotion 2019 Position PhD Student Company Universidad Politécnica de Madrid What is current occupation? I am currently doing my thesis on photovoltaic solar energy at the Solar Energy Institute of the University of Madrid. How has the Master impacted your career? I studied the Master’s because it was one of the few […]

Name Manuel Castillo Promotion 2009/2010 Position COO and founding partner Company QPV What is current occupation? I am currently COO of the company that I founded 6 years ago with 2 other colleagues from IES-UPM and that already has about 20 workers. Company specialized in providing high added value services in the photovoltaic sector and […]

Name Jesús Heras Promotion 2014/2015 Position Technical Director South West Europe Company Wattkraft What is current occupation? Currently I work at Wattkraft, a general European distributor and systems integrator for major international corporations. I am Technical Director for South West Europe market where we are specialized in Huawei smart string inverters, Huawei BESS and system […]

Name Inés Durán Promotion 2020/2021 Position PhD Student Company Instituto de Energía Solar What is current occupation? I am currently following a PhD program at Instituto de Energía Solar, specifically in the group “Silicio y Nuevos Conceptos”. I study the optoelectronic properties of two-dimensional materials (such as graphene, boron nitride or MoS2) for their future […]

In the era of the search for sustainability, architecture and energy must go hand in hand if buildings are to play a key role in the transition towards new city models. Today, the idea that optimizing a building’s energy performance is a constraint on its design is obsolete. As teachers, we therefore have the responsibility […]

Multijunction solar cells were invented to mitigate a fundamental loss source in the conversion of light to electricity. To understand this kind of loss we have to consider these two facts: Semiconductor materials used to fabricate solar cells are characterized by their bandgap, which is the minimum energy that the light photons must have to […]

The term thin-film solar cell, or second-generation solar cell, refers to a particular type of photovoltaic (PV) device whose main characteristic is the reduced amount of active material required to manufacture efficient cells. Probably best expressed by Ken Zweibel in 2004: “the fundamental idea of thin-film-based PV technology is to use a tiny amount, on […]

Photovoltaic modules are manufactured so that they can continue to generate electricity decades after their manufacture, which is why until now efforts have been focused on using materials and processes that make the product as robust as possible, without thinking on facilitating their recycling at the end of their useful life. With the rapid increase […]

Manufacturing a silicon solar cell involves a complex sequence to transform quartz extracted from a mine into a device that, when exposed to the sun, provides electricity in a cheap, reliable and long-lasting way. This is a challenge that requires the cooperation of the metallurgical, chemical and semiconductor industries. The process begins with the carbothermic […]

Check our interviews with students of the Master in Solar Energy. On this occasion we speak with Marina Delgado.

A perovskite solar cell (PSC) is a type of 3rd generation solar cell that includes a perovskite-structured compound as the light-absorbing layer, which can be either a hybrid organic-inorganic or fully inorganic halide-based material. Perovskite-type absorbers exhibit excellent opto-electronic properties and are very high defect tolerant structure, particularly those with 3D structures such as methylammonium […]