TUNING THE ANTI-REFLECTIVE, ABRASION RESISTANCE, ANTI-SOILING AND SELF-CLEANING PROPERTIES OF TRANSPARENT COATINGS FOR DIFFERENT GLASS SUBSTRATES AND SOLAR CELLS

• Main Authors: NAIR VINOD, BROPHY BRENOR L
• Format: Patent
• Language: English
• Published: 18.09.2014
• Subjects: BASIC ELECTRIC ELEMENTS; CHEMICAL COMPOSITION OF GLASSES, GLAZES, OR VITREOUSENAMELS; CHEMISTRY; ELECTRIC SOLID STATE DEVICES NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR; ELECTRICITY; GENERAL TAGGING OF CROSS-SECTIONAL TECHNOLOGIES SPANNING OVER SEVERAL SECTIONS OF THE IPC; GENERAL TAGGING OF NEW TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS; GLASS; JOINING GLASS TO GLASS OR OTHER MATERIALS; METALLURGY; MINERAL OR SLAG WOOL; OPTICAL ELEMENTS, SYSTEMS, OR APPARATUS; OPTICS; PHYSICS; REDUCTION OF GREENHOUSE GAS [GHG] EMISSIONS, RELATED TO ENERGYGENERATION, TRANSMISSION OR DISTRIBUTION; SEMICONDUCTOR DEVICES; SURFACE TREATMENT OF FIBRES OR FILAMENTS MADE FROM GLASS,MINERALS OR SLAGS; SURFACE TREATMENT OF GLASS; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER US CLASSIFICATION; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS; TECHNOLOGIES OR APPLICATIONS FOR MITIGATION OR ADAPTATION AGAINSTCLIMATE CHANGE

Functionalized coatings preferentially coated on the tin-side of float glass used in solar and other applications are disclosed. Coating compositions include silane-based precursors that are used to form coatings through a sol-gel process including hydrolyzed alkoxysilane-based sols. The coatings are characterized by anti-reflective, abrasion resistant, and anti-soiling properties and the tunability of those properties with respect to different applications. The coatings formed from the compositions described herein have wide application, including, for example, use as abrasion resistant coatings on the outer glass of solar modules, wherein the coating adheres through siloxane linkages. In some embodiments, when applied to glass and cured at a temperature of less than 300° C., the dried sol gel has abrasion resistance sufficient to pass standard EN-1096-2 with a loss of transmission of no more than 0.5% and enables a post-test light transmission gain of greater than 1% as compared to uncoated glass.