The company has created a 0.4 micron thick layer with 4% additional output, that cuts cleaning water use by 55%.
The economics of solar power in India reveals a significant gap between what solar panels can deliver in a controlled laboratory environment (20% to 22% solar panel efficiency) and their actual production once they are installed in the field (15% to 18% solar panel efficiency). Dust on the panels creates some of this gap and temperature exacerbates it. Finally, as dust accumulates on the uncoated glass, the light that would typically reflect off the surface will now go unused.
The conventional response is cleaning, and cleaning has its own costs. A single megawatt plant can consume between 20,000 and 30,000 litres of water per cleaning cycle. In Rajasthan, where water is sometimes trucked in by tanker, that is not an operational inconvenience. It is a direct threat to the viability of the plant itself.
Dr Harsh Sethi, a materials engineer who spent two decades in energy and global operations before founding TriNANO Technologies, had watched this problem accumulate for years before deciding he had a specific answer to it.
At 0.4 microns, TriNANO’s solution is thinner than a human hair and bonds directly to the glass surface of a solar panel at the nanoscale. It does not require heating, baking, or specialised installation equipment, which means it works equally on a panel fresh off a production line and on an eleven-year-old panel baked by years of Madhya Pradesh summers.
Once applied, it does four things simultaneously. It guides more sunlight into the solar cells rather than letting it scatter away, reduces the amount of light that reflects off the glass unused, it creates a surface that dust, oil, and grime struggle to stick to, so when rain falls or wind blows, the panel cleans itself more effectively, and it reflects some of the infrared heat that causes panels to run hot, keeping surface temperatures 2 to 3 degrees Celsius lower than uncoated panels, which matters because overheated panels generate less power and wear out faster.
The technology has been independently validated at IIT Bombay’s National Centre for Photovoltaic Research and Education through thermal cycling, humidity testing, UV exposure, and months of outdoor soiling trials.
