Technical Program

Plenary Speakers


Area 1: Victor Ivanovich Klimov, Los Alamos National Laboratory

Engineered Quantum Dots in Solar Energy Conversion: Photovoltaics and Beyond

Dr. Victor I. Klimov is a fellow of Los Alamos National Laboratory and director of the Center for Advanced Solar Photophysics. The focus of his research is on photophysical properties and device applications of semiconductor nanocrystals.


Area 2: Ingrid Repins, National Renewable Energy Laboratory

Wild band edges: The role of bandgap grading and potential fluctuations in making high-efficiency chalcogenide devices

Dr. Repins is a senior scientist at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, where she has been principal investigator for work related to kesterites, CIGS, and module performance. She has been delighted to participate, over 25+ years, in the transformation of chalcogenide devices from mysterious goop on a slide to many gigawatts deployed.


Area 3: Geoffrey Kinsey, Department of Energy

CPV in the next decade: zombie or superhero?

Geoffrey S. Kinsey is a technical advisor in the U.S. Department of Energy's Solar Energy Technologies Office involved in PV R&D, codes and standards, and service lifetime. He has over eighty publications and holds a B.S. from Yale University and a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin.


Area 4: Pierre Verlinden, Trina Solar

Mass production of high-efficiency p-type PERC solar cell: how high can we go?

Dr. Pierre Verlinden is Vice-President and Chief Scientist at Trina Solar, Changzhou, China. He is also Vice-Chair of the State Key Laboratory of PV Science and Technology at Trina Solar and adjunct Professor at Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou. He has been involved with the development of high-efficiency Silicon solar cells for more than 35 years. He holds M.S. and PhD degrees in Electrical Engineering from the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium.


Area 5: Thorsten Trupke, University of New South Wales

Progress with Photoluminescence Characterisation in Photovoltaics

Thorsten Trupke is a semiconductor physicist with more than 15 years’ experience in research and development in the PV sector, with emphasis on novel characterization methods. Thorsten is a Professor at the School for Photovoltaic and Renewable Energy Engineering at the University of New South Wales and also co-founder and CTO of BT Imaging, a UNSW start-up company that commercializes photoluminescence imaging inspection systems.


Area 6: Michael Graetzel, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

Mesoscopic photovoltaics and perovskite solar cells

Professor at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland where he directs the laboratory of photonics and interfaces Michael Graetzel is the inventor if mesoscopic solar cells, whose production has already reached the multi-megawatt scale and which have engendered perovskite solar cells - one of the current most exciting developments in photovoltaics.


Area 7: Gregory Carr, Jet Propulsion

End-To-End System Level Trade Considerations for Deep Space PV Systems

Greg Carr is a Power System Engineer for Power and Sensor Systems Section 346 at JPL. His primary responsibility is the development of new power system architectures. He recently served as the Avionics Power Chief Engineer on the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), which is a radioisotope powered rover designed for the surface of Mars. Greg is currently a member of the NASA Engineering and Safety Center (NESC) Electrical Power Technical Discipline Team (TDT). Greg has over 20 years of experience in power electronics design and power system engineering. He started his career designing the power control and power distribution interface for Cassini. Greg has a BSEE degree from UCLA..


Area 8: Thomas Reindl, Solar Energy Research Institute of Singapore

LCOE reduction of PV electricity – does technology still matter?

Dr. Reindl is the Deputy CEO of the Solar Energy Research Institute of Singapore (SERIS), Director of the Solar Energy Systems cluster at SERIS and a Principal Research Fellow at the National University of Singapore. He started with PV in 1992 at the Siemens Corporate R&D Labs. He is the official Singapore representative of the International Energy Agency Task 40, invited member of the Singapore Green Building Council, the SPRING Technology Enterprise Commercialisation program evaluation committee and the scientific advisory committee of the Singapore Science Center.


Area 9: Christian Hagendorf, Fraunhofer – Center for Silicon-Photovoltaics CSP

Potential Induced Degradation (PID) of p-type silicon: How atomistic defects can cause module degradation

Dr. Christian Hagendorf is head of the research group “Diagnostics of Solar Cells” at Fraunhofer Center for Silicon Photovoltaics CSP, Germany. He obtained his PhD at Martin-Luther-University Halle-Wittenberg, Germany in the field of surface and interface analysis of semiconductor materials. He joined Fraunhofer CSP in 2007 and established a research group focussed on defect diagnostics in crystalline and thin film photovoltaics. Research activities rely on optical, electrical, microstructural and trace elemental characterization of solar cells and modules


Area 10: Greg Ball, DNV GL

Rooftop PV Systems and Firefighter Safety

Greg Ball is a Principal Engineer at DNV-KEMA Renewables, Inc. (DNV GL), and serves as principal investigator and consultant on projects focusing on PV system design, components, performance, codes and standards, and grid interconnection. He has worked in the PV industry since 1990.


Area 11: Jan Kleissl, University of California, San Diego

Solar Energy Forecasting Advances and Impacts on Grid Integration

Professor Jan Kleissl received his PhD from the Johns Hopkins University in 2004 and is now at UC San Diego, where he is the Associate Director of the Center for Energy Research. His research group focuses on Solar Energy Meteorology including forecasting and distribution system modeling.


Area 12: Stefan Nowak, IEA PVPS

IEA PVPS – Global co-operation towards sustainable deployment of photovoltaic power systems

Stefan Nowak did his PhD in thermonuclear fusion at Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland. His biography is characterized by a continuous evolution from research to technology management with particular emphasis on photovoltaics. He is strongly involved in research and innovation management as well as international co-operation and serves as chairman to the IEA PVPS Programme.



Technical Program


Latest News



Technical Sponsors




Media Partners