Perovskite Solar Cells: Ground Breaking Discovery which will lead to increase in stability and efficiency

Perovskite has been hailed for its remarkable properties compared to traditional silicon solar cells, however, until now they have been too unstable to be suitable for commercial use.

 

 

The next-generation cells are expected to cost less, have a much higher power conversion efficiency, and be lightweight and flexible – opening up new applications like coating glass windows with thin layers of solar panels.

 

 

 

A team of researchers from the city university of Hongkong and Imperial College, London has made this ground-breaking discovery. The chemists were able to overcome perovskite’s difficult properties by making use of a metal-containing material called ferrocenes, which they added as an interface between the light-absorbing layer of the solar cell and the layer that transports electrons.

 

 

The unique properties of ferrocenes can help overcome the problems with perovskite solar cells,” said Professor Nicholas Long from Imperial College’s Department of Chemistry.

 

Using this breakthrough technique, the scientists became the first team to create a solar cell capable of performing at a similar level to silicon cells while still remaining stable.

 

Tests of the new solar cells found that they could run under continuous illumination for more than 1,500 hours while retaining 98 percent of their initial efficiency.

 

“The most important part of this work is that we successfully fabricated highly efficient perovskite solar cells while providing promising stability,” said Dr. Zhu Zonglong, an assistant professor in CityU’s Department of Chemistry.