There have been many new exciting advancements in Perovskite solar cell technology, with research teams from all over the world setting new efficiency records nearly every month. These discoveries should help us to see a huge upswing in the number of solar panels.
Researchers from Purdue created a hybrid organic and inorganic material that removes the need for harmful lead to make their perovskite cells. This also improved stability, makes them easier to produce, and they are more tolerant of defects. Yao Gao, lead author on the Purdue study explains how these discoveries will help:
Solar cells, as many people have demonstrated, can be highly efficient. With our new technology, we can make the hybrid perovskite materials intrinsically more stable. By replacing the toxic lead, these new materials are better for the environment and can also be safely used for bioelectronics sensors on the body.
New hybrid tandem Perovskite solar cells using stacked silicon technologies are capable of achieving significantly higher levels of efficiency. They have also figured out how to increase the stability and balance of currents with special electrode contact layers.
This video from National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in 2018 explains perovskite technology and shows how far we’ve come in just 2 short years.
The new perovskite-silicon tandem cell was a collaborative effort between Helmholtz Zentrum Berlin (HZB), and Kaunas University of Technology, in Lithuania. The hybrid tandem material they created can cover nearly 1,000 times more area than using only silicon. A license to produce this material has been purchased by Tokyo Chemical Industry Co.
Perovskite solar cells are not just achieving new efficiency records, scientists are figuring out new ways to make the cells more sustainable by using earth-abundant materials. They exhibit extremely high light absorption attributes. The nontoxic Ba(Zr, Ti)S3 chalcogenide perovskite material being used by researchers in Japan has capabilities to push efficiency over 38%.
The team from Gifu University that created the new chalcogenide perovskite believe these ultra-thin solar cells are ideal for fabrication, and when they pair them up with the correct thin-film formation technology, mass production will be possible.
Other advancements have been made in lattice thermal energy transport, which is useful in solar and thermoelectric applications, to help thermal stability and toxicity.
In December, a team from the University at Buffalo developed a thin-film made of chalcogenide perovskite barium zirconium sulfide (BaZrS3), with “very strong light absorption and good charge transport.” They think this can be especially useful for solar cell development and the manufacturing of LEDs.
These exciting changes in perovskite technology not only increase the efficiency of solar cells, but the nontoxic earth-abundant materials will effectively help to drop the price enabling greater applications of clean green energy. The future looks bright for solar!
Perovskite solar cells should hit the shelves later this year, we’ll find out just how much they will change the solar industry.
