Establishing the Basis for Industrial Development
- $449k Funded by ARENA
- $1.42m Total project cost
Summary
The project reported that perovskite solar cells (PSC) were both efficient and stable, confirming the potential viability and cost-competitiveness of PSC technology for commercial-scale manufacture.
Validate the commercialisation potential of PSC technology; Confirm the appropriate architecture of PSC’s for efficiency and stability; Establish the viability of PSC technology for scale-up and manufacture.
Key results
- Common belief is that silicon-perovskite tandems are the technologically “easiest” form of perovskite technology to industrialise. This has proven more difficult in practice, as the technical requirements for a silicon-perovskite tandems include all the needs for a perovskite-only device, plus an additional number of challenges. The additional needs make the technology development pathway for silicon-perovskite tandems substantially more demanding than the pathway for perovskite-only devices.
- A prerequisite for a successful silicon-perovskite tandem device is a viable perovskite-only device. If silicon-perovskite tandem device R&D is to be pursued, then delivering an industrially viable perovskite-only device to ensure that silicon-perovskite devices are worthwhile at all is a priority.
- For silicon-perovskite tandem products to generate much lower $/Wp cost, the perovskite component has to be both high performing and low cost. It is conceivable that lower $/Wp figures will be obtained from perovskite-only devices or perovskite-perovskite tandems, due to the inherently low cost base of perovskites
Learn more
Report: Perovskite Solar Cells: Establishing the Basis for Industrial Development
This report confirmed the viability of perovskite solar cell technology for transition to commercial-scale manufacture.
Project innovation
Dyesol’s preferred PSC architectures were experimentally evaluated. Carbon is preferred as it has appropriate electronic properties and is also low cost in both raw material and deposition processes. Preferred cell architectures evaluated by Dyesol eliminate expensive organic hole transport materials (HTMs), improving the stability and lowering the cost of the cells. Dyesol achieved >10% efficiency for the average of a batch of 1 cm2strip cells.
Benefit
The outcomes of this project validated the potential commercialisation prospects of PSC technology. This validation occurred on a number of fronts, (technical, economic, and business), and demonstrated the opportunities presented by scale-up and industrialisation of this technology. The recipient seeks to further capitalise on the progress to date, and undertake this scale-up in Australia, to generate maximum benefit for the Australian innovation ecosystem, Australia’s energy system, and the Australian economy.
