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Researchers at Fraunhofer ISE have developed a prototype of a manufacturer-neutral app for heating, ventilation, air conditioning and plumbing contractors that enables the virtual planning of heating systems. Unlike software tools already available, the “Heat Pump PlanAR” app combines various steps of the planning and installation process into a single application. The software prototype is the result of the “WESPE” collaborative project led by the Zentralverband Sanitär Heizung Klima (Central Asso-ciation for Plumbing, Heating, and Air Conditioning) ZVSHK and was designed in close collaboration with trades businesses. The application is now set to be further developed in collaboration with interested software companies and brought to market.

Since 1986, the calibration laboratory at the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE has been measuring solar cells, and since 1991, photo-voltaic (PV) modules as well. Over the course of its forty-year history, it has calibrated the performance of thousands of solar cells and modules using a wide variety of technologies. To date, the “CalLab” has confirmed 152 record results. Sixty-six of these records were for PV modules—primarily silicon modules—while 86 referred to solar cells. The first record was set in 1992 by a mini silicon solar module with an efficiency of 16.4 percent, submitted by Deutsche Aerospace Aktiengesellschaft and featuring Bayer silicon wafers. The most recent record measured by CalLab confirmed that a module from AZUR SPACE, temicon and Fraunhofer ISE, with an efficiency of 34.4 percent, is currently the world’s most efficient solar module.

Together with partners from research and industry, the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE has modified the structure of battery electrodes so that the battery cells can store 10 to 15 percent more energy at the same weight. They achieved this by more than tripling the coating thickness of the battery electrodes—for example, in lithium-ion batteries—which simultaneously reduces the number of current collectors in the battery cell. The research team implemented the new electrode architecture in lithium-ion pouch cells manufactured using industry-standard processes. Furthermore, they successfully applied the concept to zinc-ion and sodium-ion battery cells.

At high discharge currents, the temperature inside a lithium-ion cell is usually inaccessible to measurement; measurements are typically taken at the cell casing. Yet the heat generated during discharge is critical to safety and service life—and thus also to the design of the battery management system. Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE, in collaboration with Hilti AG, have developed a minimally invasive method for retrofitting thermocouples into the electrode core of commercial pouch cells. The results have been published as open access in the Journal of The Electrochemical Society.

Lithium has become an indispensable part of our daily lives, yet its extraction takes a toll on the environment and local livelihoods. This is where the German-Chilean research project “PaNaBat” comes in: a joint networking platform aims to strengthen collaboration in research, education, technology transfer, and industrial cooperation in the areas of sustainable battery raw materials, lithium extraction, and battery recycling. Fraunhofer ISE is contributing its extensive laboratory and research infrastructure for the development of battery materials and cell technologies.