December 14, 2009 – The Supervisory Council of the Russian Corporation of Nanotechnologies (RUSNANO) recently approved two new measures: one for producing concentrated photovoltaic technology, and participation in work to develop porous nanostructured nonmetallic coatings.
In the former, RUSNANO aims to commercialize research coming out of the Ioffe Physical Technical Institute involving scientific principles and technical basis for concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) technology. Work will involve developing photoconverters with targeted efficiency of 37%-45% utilizing "cascading solar cells" (based on a nano-heterostructure) sized 4mm×4mm onto which solar light is focused 900-fold by 50×50mm Fresnel lenses; "specially designed naturally cooling heat sinks" keep the solar modules from overheating. The CPV cells used in tandem with the concentrators will be produced via modified chemical vapor deposition (CVD) method for different semiconductor materials on germanium substrate. The work also will involve producing high-precision sun tracking systems.
A full production cycle, including cultivation of nano-heterostructures, chip manufacturing, module assembly, sun-tracking systems production, and solar PV plant assembly, will be created under the project. The resulting plants are expected to put out ~85MW/year, with anticipated revenue by 2015 exceeding €130 million. Module Solar AG and a startup around the Ioffe technology (dubbed "Solnechniy Potok," or "Solar flux") will be involved in the project. RUSNANO will invest 1.29B rubles (about US$42.6M/€29.1M) in cash, matched by the other members of the project in funding and IP; another 3.15B rubles ($104.1M/€71M) will be solicited from investors.
Nanocoatings for metal surfaces
RUSNANO also has given the greenlight to participation in development of porous nanostructured nonmetallic inorganic materials, leveraging microarc oxidation (MAO) technology developed at Tomsk State University (with equipment and engineering provided by Sibspark).
The main focus of this project will be processing lines for applying inorganic nonmetallic ceramic coatings on metal surfaces. The MAO technique, developed in the 1980s, required large amounts of energy and was more expensive than traditional treatments. The improved version developed by Tomsk researchers uses "intricately designed power sources" (no further description offered by RUSNANO) to make the process more cost-effective. MAO is said to provide better resistance against wear (up to 2×-8×), corrosion, and heat, and improves "decorative properties" for metals including aluminum, magnesium, titanium, and zirconium, RUSNANO says. The technology is also deemed "environmentally safe" as it is produces no cyanide and nickel/chromium waste and "is less explosion hazardous."
Total budget for the project, to be housed at Tomsk, will be 105M rubles ($3.5M/€2.4M), with 50M rubles ($1.6M/€1.1M) financed by RUSNANO; EleSi, a developer of industrial automation systems, also will co-invest in the project and provide implementation support. Full capacity output starting with 20 MAO processing lines/year is expected in three years.
Opportunities are seen in applications for construction, engineering, consumer electronics, and automotive/aircraft, both in Russia and worldwide. RUSNANO pegged the metal processing market art $34.6B in 2008, of which ~$4.5B was accessories and consumables; from 2009-2015 the larger market is expected to grow 6% annually to exceed $52B.
"The energy efficiency of MAO can provide a large-scale replacement of traditional surface treatment technologies such as electroplating, anodizing, and many others, allowing for greater hardness together with low-cost production and environmental safety," said Constantine Demetriou, managing director of RUSNANO, in a statement.