Full commercialisation of organic photovoltaics (OPV) is hindered by scaling issues – by 2018 modules must demonstrate proven efficiencies of > 8%, lifetimes in excess of 10 years and must be manufactured at a cost of < $0.5/watt if OPV is to be competitive with existing and other emerging PV technologies.
Report extract
Full commercialisation of organic photovoltaics (OPV) is hindered by scaling issues – by 2018 modules must demonstrate proven efficiencies of > 8%, lifetimes in excess of 10 years and must be manufactured at a cost of < $0.5/watt if OPV is to be competitive with existing and other emerging PV technologies.
State‐of‐the‐art: The total global cumulative installed capacity of PV now exceeds 100GW and will grow exponentially to 2020 and beyond. Manufacturing costs for traditional thin film and c Si PV modules are now < $1.00/watt. Organic solar cells have recently achieved efficiencies at the lab‐ scale of 10% (solution processed) and 12% (vacuum evaporated). The best minimodules based upon serially connected thin strip junctions lie in the 5‐9% range. We expect to see lab‐scale cells at 13‐ 15% within the next 2 years but mini‐and‐sub‐module efficiencies will only improve when a number of key technical challenges are overcome. Module‐level efficiencies must reach at least 8% at pilot‐ manufacturing scale by 2015.
The key players: With the demise of Konarka in 2012, the leading OPV manufacturer is Heliatek in Germany with their multi‐junction p‐i‐n vacuum evaporated technology. Toshiba and Mitsubishi in Japan have invested heavily and may well emerge as the first‐to manufacturing if their impressive laboratory‐scale cell efficiencies can be translated to the module level. Research activity in organic solar cells has exploded in the past 5 years and this activity is supported by a “cottage industry” of photoactive and ancillary component suppliers. The big chemical companies (BASF and MERCK) continue to have a strong presence particularly in materials development and should not be discounted. Konarka, Plextronics and Princeton dominate the historical device, process and materials IP landscape although we should see new patents on (for example) narrow optical gap photoactive polymers flowing through from companies such as Solamer in 2014‐2015.
