In association with partners for the PERCISTAND project, researchers at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology have fabricated perovskite/CIS tandem solar cells with an efficiency of approximately 25%, which is the highest value attained thus far for the technology.
The combination of this material is light and versatile to make it possible to envision the use of tandem solar cells in vehicles, devices, portable equipment that can be folded or rolled up. The results are presented in the journal ACS Energy Letters.
In fact, over the past decade, perovskite solar cells have made remarkable progress. The efficiency of perovskite solar cells is now comparable to long-used silicon solar cells. Perovskites are innovative substances with a special crystal structure.
Worldwide, researchers are working to obtain perovskite photovoltaic technology ready for practical applications. The higher the electricity generation per unit surface area, the more attractive solar cells are for consumers.
Importantly, the efficiency of solar cells can be elevated by stacking two or more cells. If the ability to absorb light from a different part of the solar spectrum is present in each of the stacked cells, inherent losses can be reduced and efficiency increased. The ability suggests how much of incident light is converted into electricity. The versatility of perovskite solar cells make them excellent components of such tandems.
Meanwhile, tandem solar cells composed of silicon and perovskite have reached a record efficiency of over 29%, which is considerably higher than that of individual cells composed of silicon or perovskite.
Interestingly, combining perovskites with other substances such as copper-indium-gallium-diselenide or copper-indium-diselenide promises further advantages. Such combinations will make it viable to fabricate flexible and light solar cells that can be placed on vehicles and buildings.
