EE5093 Week 4-5

Chapter 5. Thin Film Solar Cell

Technology

Asst. Prof. Leong Wei Lin

Office location: S1-B1c-102
Email: [email protected]
Consultation hours: Every Wednesday, 4pm – 5.30pm

College of Engineering
School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
 LEARNING OBJECTIVES FOR WEEK 4

• Why Thin Film Solar Cells?

• Describe the main characteristics of the following thin

film solar cells:

❖ Amorphous Si solar cell

❖ Poly-Si thin film solar cell
❖ CIS-CIGS thin film solar cell
❖ CdTe thin film solar cell

2
Photovoltaics generations
FIRST Generation
Silicon (Monocrystalline, Polycrystalline)
• 85% of current market
• requires many energy intensive processes at high
• temperature (400 – 1400 °C) and high vacuum

SECOND Generation
Thin film (Amorphous silicon, CdTe, CIGS)
• Potential for flexible modules and lower cost
Alan Heeger (Nobel Prize
laureate in Chemistry)

THIRD Generation
Organic/Hybrid (Bulk heterojunction, Dye-
sensitized, perovskites)
• Low temperature processing, printable
• Potential for flexible modules and lower cost

3
Thin Film Solar Cell

• A thin-film solar cell is a second generation solar

cell that is made by depositing one or more thin
layers, or thin film (TF) of photovoltaic material on a
substrate, such as glass, plastic or metal. Thin-film
solar cells are commercially used in several
technologies, including cadmium
telluride (CdTe), copper indium gallium diselenide
(CIGS), and amorphous thin-film silicon (a-Si).

4
Why Thin Film Solar Cells?

• Advantages:
– Small thickness → less raw materials cost
– Potential for low cost solar cells
– Light-weight solar cells
– Flexible solar cells
– Lower energy consumption for device fabrication

• Disadvantages:
– Defect/traps assisted recombination becomes more
important
– Environmental concerns (eg. Cd waste)

5
Crystalline vs. Thin Film Solar Cells
impt to know the difference

• Crystalline PV Technologies
– Lattice-matched substrates,
slow growth.
uses high temp.

Very few defects = high performance

– $/Watt = Expensive Process/Higher Performance

• Thin Film PV Technologies

– Economic considerations dominate
make them in a very short time
– High throughput, inexpensive substrates
– Produce lots of defects that limit device performance
– $/Watt = Cheaper Process/Lower Performance 6
Issues to Consider in Thin Film Solar Cells

• Substrates
temperature used determines what kind of substrate you
produce. if you want to produce under 400 deg C, you have to
use glass material since plastic will melt

• Grains
– Defects in grains

• Grain Boundary undesired. we want to make grains as large

as possible

– Electrical activity at grain

boundaries and other
defects

• Interaction between
different layers of device
and properties of the
interfaces
7
Growth of Thin Films

Deposition Processes for Thin Films

• Primary goal -High rate, good quality, low cost
• Physical Vacuum Processes
– r.f and d.c. Magnetron Sputtering
– E-beam or Thermal Evaporation
• Chemical Vapor Processes (CVD)
low pressure
– LP CVD, PECVD plasma-enhanced
• Atmospheric Pressure Processes
– Chemical Bath Deposition (CBD), Spread
Deposition, various printings

8
Plasma Enhanced CVD (PECVD)
• Pressure: 0.3 –2 Torr

• Electrode Gap: 1 –3 cm

• Sub. Temp.: 150 –300oC

• RF Power: 5–25 mW/cm2

• Dep. Rate: ~ 0.3 nm/sec

• H2:SiH4 to get μm-Si

formation: ~ 30:1

9
Part 1. Amorphous Silicon Solar
Cells

10
Amorphous Silicon (a-Si)
• The term “Amorphous Silicon”
commonly applied to non-
crystalline materials prepared
by deposition from gases

• Non-crystalline:
– Chemical bonding of
atoms nearly unchanged
from crystals, but
randomly oriented
– Small, disorderly variation https://timestech.in/amorphous-silicon-solar-market-at-a-cagr-of-x-x-over-
the-period-of-forecast/
in angles between bonds
eliminated regular lattice
structure

11
Defects in a-Si

enhances recombination
and decreasing efficiency

❑ Defects appear as dangling bonds in a-Si, creating traps

level in the middle of the bandgap.
❑ a-Si without H contains unsaturated dangling bonds, defect
density ~ 1019/cm3, essentially useless for PV applications
the moment we shine light, all
these photogenerated carriers
will be trapped in these
defects. So we use H bonds
to passivate the defect
density. 12
Adding H to a-Si

• H in a-Si (5-20%, from decomposition of SiH4)

saturates dangling bonds, reduces defect
density to 1015–1016/cm3

• Adding H to a:Si also:

– Improves material quality
– But increases band gap, thus PV power rate
decrease the solar spectrum that you can actually harvest will be
reduced. Power conversion efficiency will also reduce.

13
Advantages of a-Si:H

• Technology is relatively simple and inexpensive for a-

Si:H
• For a given layer thickness, a-Si:H absorbs much
more energy than μc-Si (about 2.5 times)
• Much less material requires for a-Si:H films, lighter
weight and less expensive
• Can be deposited on a wide range of substrates,
including flexible, curved and roll-away types
• Overall efficiency of ~ 10%, still lower than multi-
crystalline silicon solar cells

14
Doping and Simple Devices
undoped

• Undoped a-Si:H is typically intrinsic or

slightly n-type
– Contains impurities (O, N and C) at 1018–
1019/cm3
– Reduction of these impurities to 1015/cm3
range does not improve device performance
• Luckily, extrinsic doping just like in c-Si
and poly-Si results p-type by doping
boron and n-type by phosphorus
15
Doping and Simple Devices
• Unfortunately, doping decreases electrical
quality (reduces carrier lifetime)
– Cannot use doped layers for absorber layers
– Use intrinsic i-layer for high-performance devices

• Boron (p-type) diffuses at high temperature.

Phosphorus (n-type) more stable, so desirable
to grow i-layer on n-layer

16
Typical a-Si:H Solar Cell
(Single Junction)
• P-layer
– 8 –20 nm
– Wide band gap (a=SiC:H or
μc-Si:H)
– Boron doped
intrinsic
layer • i-layer
– 200 –500 nm make it thicker to absorb
as much light as possible

more stable layer, – 1.68 –1.75 eV band gap increased here after
so wont diffuse passivation. it was originally 1.1eV
for monocrystalline
• n-layer
easily

– 20 –40 nm
– Phosphorous doped
**the p and n layer cannot be swapped --> explanation in the prev slide
17
Light Stability
• Light induced degradation: significant changes in
optoelectronic properties of a-Si:H under light
illumination over time. This is known as Staebler-
Wronski Effect (SWE).
• Proposed mechanism: Light breaks the Si-H bond →
increasing dangling bond density over time. hydrogen passivation will
become less and less ineffective

• But it is reversible on annealing at 150oC for a few hours.

hence we usually use this indoors when light is not so strong like direct sunlight

18
Fabrication of a-Si Thin Film Solar Cell

to make substrate non-conducting

seal solar cell to

protect from weather

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IED-OYzYJzY 19
Part 2. Poly-Si Thin Film Solar
Cells

20
Poly-Si Thin Film Solar Cells
• The main characteristics that distinguishes poly Si with
the other Si solar cell is the presence of grain
more grain
boundaries. boundaries, more
recombination
• Within a grain (> 1 µm), the band structure and induced, less
effective
absorption coefficient is similar to single crystal Si.
• Atomic dislocations at the grain boundaries, however,
creates majority carrier traps and recombination
centers for minority carriers that limit the carrier
transports in poly Si material. how big the grain is used to
distinguish the different types of
A picture of grain boundaries
for polysilicon.
silicon solar cells

21
Si Cell Cost vs. Performance
PV cost –compromise between Si material
cost (quality) and final module performance:

22
OVERVIEW OF THE LECTURE

• Why Thin Film Solar Cells?

• Describe the main characteristics of the following thin

film solar cells:

❖ Amorphous Si solar cell

❖ Poly-Si thin film solar cell
❖ CIS-CIGS thin film solar cell
❖ CdTe thin film solar cell

23
Part 3. Cadmium Telluride (CdTe)
Solar Cell

24
 CdTe vs Si

• Si is expensive due to purification cost

– High purity – controlled doping
– Need thick wafers (due to indirect bandgap of Si)

• CdTe is a direct bandgap thin film compound

semiconductor
– 100 times more absorbing than Si
– Polycrystalline thin film

25
Structure of CdTe Solar cell

Record Efficiency: 22.1%

26
CdTe/CdS Solar cell
1. Cadmium Sulphide (CdS)
• N-type
• Eg ~ 2.4eV (wide band gap)
• Thickness: ~100 nm
• Most light will pass through to the CdTe,
due the thinness of the CdS layer
n type

2. Cadmium Telluride (CdTe)

p
type
• P-type
• Direct energy band of Eg ~ 1.45 eV
• Thickness of this layer is around 2-8 µm

3. Back contact
• Back contact is made by the screen printing
technology.
27
 CdTe Layer
P-N junction is within CdTe
layer (not at exactly the
interface with CdS)

Two Processing Categories:

• Low deposition. • High deposition
temperature (< 425oC) temperature (> 500oC).
• Small grain. • Larger grain.
lower quality less grain boundary

• Oriented with stress. • Low stress.

28
Where is the P-N Junction
there is mixed compound formation due to diffusion

Within CdTe layer (near the interface with CdS)

29
 NO NEED TO MEMORISE
Preparation of CdTe layer

• Wide range of deposition techniques: close-spaced sublimation,

physical vapor deposition, electrodeposition, screen printing
30
Preparation of CdTe layer

• Close-space sublimation (CSS) is based on the reversible dissociation of the

materials at 450-600 °C: 2CdTe(s) = Cd(g) + Te2(g).
• The source is of a large area and is positioned close to the substrate. The substrate
and source, separated by a small distance (1 mm for instance)
• Sublimation of the compounds produces monatomic Cd and diatomic Te2 vapor,
which recombines by the reverse reaction on the relatively cool substrate.

31
CdCl2 Heat Treatment – key to efficiency

• The most crucial step in the fabrication of the cell, can

be called “CdCl2 activation step”. Typically converts a
cell of efficiency <1% to >10%.
• Treatment with solution CdCl2 (dip in CdCl2 methanol)
or vapor CdCl2. Treatment temperature of around
400oC.
• This annealing process is accomplished after the CdTe
layer is grown on the CdS layer and prior to the back-
contact deposition. The CdCl2 treatment has positive
effects on the CdTe solar cell, such as growth of larger
CdTe grains and the passivation of defects.

32
CdCl2 Heat Treatment – key to efficiency

Journal of Materials Science: Materials in Electronics, 28 (22), pp

16598–16617 (2017)

33
Applications of CdTe Solar Cell
First Solar Sets CdTe Module
Efficiency World Record,
Launches Series 3 Black Module
• 16.1 Percent Total Area
Efficiency Module Confirmed by
NREL;
• https://youtu.be/iuXjkVzePIA

Topaz Solar Farm (California) Greenough River Solar Farm (Australia)

earth observatory image (2015) 34

Challenges of CdTe Solar Cells

• The cost of module and BOS (Balance Of the

System) is high.
• Te is rare in nature.
• Cd is toxic – brings environmental waste
concerns

35
Part 4. Copper Indium Gallium
Selenide (CIGS) Solar Cells

36
Typical Structure

Source:NREL

37
CIGS Solar cell
1. Cadmium Sulphide (CdS)
• N-type
• Thickness: 50 – 100 nm

2. CIGS
• P-type
• Bandgap varying with Ga content from
1.0eV (for CuInSe) to 1.7eV for
(CuGaSe)
• Thickness: 1 – 2 um

3. Molybdenum (Mo)
• Back contact
• Thickness: 0.5 – 1 um
38
 Deposition Methods and CIGS
Formation
Crystalline PV Technologies
Evaporation of the Elements Vacuum
Sputtering of Elements Vacuum
Nanotechnology/Nano-particles-(Inks) Printing
CVD-based (lab. R&D) Low vacuum

CIGS Formation Pathways

1a. Cu + In + Ga=> Cu:In:Ga intermetallic
1b. Cu:In:Ga intermetallic +H2Se (or Se) => Cu(In,Ga)Se2
2. Cu2Se + (In,Ga)2Se3=> Cu(In, Ga)Se2
3. Cu + In + Ga+ Se=> Cu(In,Ga)Se2
39
The effect of Ga Content on the Efficiency of
CIGS Solar Cells
Cu

Se
In/Ga

bandgap open circuit voltage short circuit current

Ga content (X) increases → Eg increases → Voc increase, Isc decreases

40
Energy Band-gap of CIGS
no need to memorise, just need to know that when you make to thin film, the general band gap increases

41
Processing steps of CIGS solar cells
Basic idea of CIGS solar cell manufacturing using roll-to-roll
deposition technology

Source: Filsom

• Deposition of CIGS: multi-source elemental co-evaporation

• Deposition of CdS: Solution (Chemical Bath Deposition): CdSO4, NH4OH,
N2H4CS, H2O, Temperature: 60oC –85oC, Time: 4 –40 min.
42
 CIGS Solar Cell

• CIGS surface
looks dark as all
the visible light
can be absorbed

43
Flexibility of CIGS (Polymer
Substrate)

44
Ultra-light weight CIGS (Polymer
Substrate)

45
Challenges of CIGS Solar Cells

• Vacuum-based deposition → high investment

cost
• Use of Ga and In → concerns over raw
materials cost
• Use of toxic Cd buffer layer → concerns over
environmental issues

46
EE5093 Week 4-5

Chapter 6. Third Generation Solar

Cells

Asst. Prof. Leong Wei Lin

Office location: S1-B1c-102
Email: [email protected]
Consultation hours: Every Wednesday, 4pm – 5.30pm

College of Engineering
School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
Different types of solar cells

Multicrystal Si solar cell

Monocrystalline Si solar cell
Record efficiency : 22.3 % CIGS solar cell
Record efficiency : 26.1 %
Record efficiency : 23.4 %

CdTe solar cell Organic solar cell DSSC solar cell

Record efficiency : 22.1 % Record efficiency : 18.2 % Record efficiency : 13%

48
Third generation solar cells/ Solution processed
photovoltaics
Types of solution processed photovoltaics:

1. Organic bulk heterojunction solar cells

• Blend of semiconducting polymers
and molecules (spontaneous self-
assembly)
• Record efficiency: 18.2%

2. Dye-sensitized solar cells Integrated DSSC window panels at

• Sensitizing wide bandgap TiO2 Swiss Tech Convention Center

with dye
• Record efficiency: 13.0%

3. Perovskite solar cells

• Perovskite structure (ABX3)
eg. CH3NH3PbX3, X = halogen
• Record efficiency: 25.7% San Francisco Bus Shelters using
organic solar cells roof

49
 LEARNING OBJECTIVES FOR WEEK 5

• Describe the main characteristics of the following 3rd

generation solar cells:

❖ Organic solar cell

❖ Dye-sensitized solar cell
❖ Perovskite solar cell

50
Part 1. Organic Solar Cell (OSC)

51
Organic (“Plastic) Semiconductors

ethylene polyethylene
insulator

polyacetylene
acetylene
conductor or
semiconductor
Organic Photovoltaics (OPV)

• 1906 - Photoconductivity in
organic solid
• 1953 - Dark conductivity in
organic single crystals
• 1977 - Conductivity in
polymers
• 1986 - 1st heterojunction
OPV (Ching W Tang, Kodak)
• 1987 - 1st Organic LED
(OLED)
• 1993 - 1st OPV from solution
processing
• 2001 - 1st certified Organic
SC (2.5% SCE)
Organic Photovoltaics (OPV)

Advantages
1. Low cost.
2.Solution processible, lightweight and flexible OPVs.
3.Roll to roll coating technologies could realize the scalable production
process with high productivity.
4.High absorption coefficient (≥105cm-1).
5.Less energy consumption during fabrication process, less CO2 emission.

Applications:
• Power generation windows
• Architectural surfaces
• Car windshield
• Optical sensors & switches etc. OPVIUS OPV Solartree

SunCurtain
54
Organic semiconductors for photovoltaics
Donor and Acceptor components form charge
separating heterojunctions

PCDTBT

PCBM

Bulk heterojunction material

Bicontinuous
interpenetrating networks

Bulk Heterojunction (BHJ):

• Fully mixed solution phase-separates on the nanoscale as solvent evaporates

→ donor/acceptor interpenetrating network
• Donor: can be polymers or small molecules (eg. P3HT, PCDTBT)
Acceptor: typically fullerene molecules (PCBM)

55
Processes within an organic solar cell
• Electron donor: “p-type”. Also the light
ZnO harvesting unit or light absorber
(eg. P3HT,MEH-PPV)

PEDOT:PSS
• Electron acceptor: “n-type”
(eg.PCBM, PTCDI)
◼ Donor domains
◼ Acceptor domains

• Hole Transporting Layer: PEDOT:PSS, Nickel oxide (NiO)

• Electron Transporting Layer: Zinc oxide (ZnO), titanium dioxide (TiO2)

• Cathode: Al, Au, Ag, Cu

• Anode: ITO PEDOT:PSS

56
Interfacial layers for Photovoltaics

Hole-extracting, electron
blocking layer 1. Minimization of the energy barrier
facilitate holes to reach the
TCO layer
for charge injection and extraction
- → Increase photocurrent and open-
X
- circuit voltage
- - -
Cathode
2. Formation of a selective contact for
Light single types of charge carrier →
TCO

Reduce recombination at the

Photoactive Aluminum
layer electrode by serving as “blocking”
layers

Anode 3. Act as optical spacer

+ + + +
X
+ 4. Prevent chemical or physical reaction
between the active layer and
electrode
Electron-extracting,
hole blocking layer

57
From Lab to Fab

58
Control of BHJ morphology
to encourage optimum charge separation

• Weight ratio of the electron donating (D) and electron accepting (A)
materials
• Heat treatment
• Solvents (high boiling point versus low boiling point)
• Solvent additives
induce diff b.p

ZnO

holes should move to red region

◼ Donor domains p type
◼ Acceptor domains n type

PEDOT:PSS not good for red region to be all at the top then
there may not be enough holes to move
towards the TCO side, so we have the 4
points to control the BHJ morphology

59
Processes within an organic solar cell
1. Incoming photons are absorbed on
the electron donor layer (eg. P3HT)
→ Creation of excitons (electron-hole pairs)
Note: Excitons in organic materials
has low εr or high binding energies,
preventing thermal dissociation –
thus requiring a different method of
dissociation.

2. A common method is to get the

exciton to an interface between
materials with energy levels that have
an offset greater than the exciton’s
https://pubs.acs.org/cen/coverstory/88/8834cover.html binding energy. Excitons are
separated at the donor/acceptor
interface → creation of free charge
carriers

3. Once dissociated, the free charges

move to the electrodes of the cell
(where they are collected) – this is
assisted by built-in and applied
electric fields.
Processes within an organic solar cell
1. Excitons in materials with low εr have
high binding energies, preventing
thermal dissociation – thus requiring a
different method of dissociation.

2. A common method is to get the exciton

to an interface between materials with
energy levels that have an offset
greater than the exciton’s binding
energy.

3. This enables the electron (or hole) to

transfer to the other material, and
https://pubs.acs.org/cen/coverstory/88/8834cover.html dissociate the exciton.

Donor-Acceptor pair 4. Once dissociated, the free charges

diffuse to the electrodes of the cell
(where they are collected) – this is
assisted by built-in and applied electric
fields.

5. The built-in electric field of a device

arises from the relative energy levels
of the materials that make up the cell.
Bi-layer versus bulk heterojuction architecture

Source: Organic Photonics and Photovoltaics. DOI: 10.1515/oph-2015-0007.

• In a BHJ configuration, both the electron donating (D) and electron accepting (A)
materials are mixed to form an donor/acceptor interpenetrating network.
• The advantages of this structure includes:
▪ Higher D/A surface area
▪ Thicker active material is possible
• Therefore, higher efficiency is obtained by a BHJ blend as compared to a bi-layer.

62
Organic Solar Cell Fabrication
Spin-coat
Etching PEDOT:PSS

Spin-coat organic layer

Electrodes deposition

PEDOT:PSS
ITO Top Electrode
Glass Organic Layer

OPV device is fabricated and measured

OPV device fabrication by solution
processed of active materials. in the moisture free glovebox

Typical OPV device fabricated on ITO/glass 63

Roll to roll fabrication of organic solar cells

Roll to roll fabrication of polymer solar cell, materials today, 15, 1-2, 36, 2012.
64
Light weight, flexible and colorful solar cells

OPVIUS OPV Solartree

San Francisco Bus Shelters using

organic solar cells roof

OPV modules integrated in colour printed,

translucent ETFE films (Merck KGaA) Infinity PV, Woven flexible organic solar cells
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_6RWkCgd2w

65
Organic solar cells

Limitations: inefficient utilization of the

solar energy by current available materials.
How to improve? 66
Single Junction Solar Cells
→Tandem Solar Cells

Tandem solar cells have

potential to exceed 20-30%.

Schematic representation of an organic tandem device

comprised of two sub-cells having different, complementary
absorption spectra.
67
Challenges of Organic Solar Cells
• The fundamental limitations of organic solar cell is the
insufficient bandgap to cover the solar spectrum →
develop low-bandgap polymers or tandem solar cells
• Electron acceptor is typically fullerene (not stable and
expensive). Non-fullerene acceptors is now heavily
research upon.
• Attain higher efficiencies for large area modules.
• Scale-up processes
• Reliability, stability

68
Part 2. Dye Sensitized Solar
Cells (DSSC)

69
Dye Sensitized Solar Cell (DSSC)
Dye-sensitized solar cell (DSC) Bulk hetero-junction (BHJ)

Glass P-type materials

Electrolyte Transparent electrode
dye
Electrolyte p-type
Bulk
porous TiO2 + heterojunction
Dye materials
TiO2 n-type Organic n-type
dense TiO2 materials
substrate and conductor screen
(image courtesy of Bosch)

• Conversion through photo-electrochemical processes

• Photoactive dye catches photons and excites electrons.
Similar to chlorophyll!
• Also know as the “Grätzel cell”, named after the
inventor (Prof. Michael Grätzel, EPFL, Switzerland,
1991).

70
Dye Sensitized Solar Cell (DSSC)

Where is the p-n junction here?

71
Dye Sensitized Solar Cell (DSSC)

Photo-electrochemical processes:
1. Dye excited from ground state
after photon absorption

2. Dye molecule is oxidised, and

electron is injected into the anode

3. Oxidised dye is regenerated by e-

donation from Iodide in the
electrolyte

4. Iodide, is regenerated by the

reduction of I3- at the cathode

72
Dye Sensitized Solar Cell (DSSC)

1. Sun light absorbed in Dye (Sensitizer)

→ Carriers Generation

2. Electron transport through Oxide

Nanocrystalline Film (Photoanode)

3. Hole transport through Liquid

Electrolyte or Solid State Hole
Transport Material (Redox Electrolyte)

4. Charge Collection at Electrodes (TCO

& Counter Electrode)

73
3 key ingredients of dye sensitized solar cells
Sensitizing Dye Titania Nanoparticles Electrolyte

Ionic liquid
Iodide/tri-iodide
Chemical Structure of N3 Dye 20 nm Titania nanoparticles redox couple
Dye Sensitized Solar Cell (DSSC)
• Low-light operation – indoor DSSCs
• Environmentally benign
• Can be applied on windows – versatile integration
• Manufacturing process is simple, doesn’t involve high
energy vacuum processes

Gratzel Solar
Backpack

Integrated DSSC window panels at Swiss Tech

Convention Center

75
Part 3. Perovskite Solar Cell

76
Where can we go beyond Si?

77
Progress in perovskite solar cell efficiencies
Simple straightforward processing

Equimolar CH3NH3I, PbI2 solution

Single step deposition

PbI2 + CH3NH3I→CH3NH3PbI3
Solid state perovskite solar cells

TiO2 mesoporous
layer based solar
cells

Kim, H.-S. et al. Scientific Reports 2, 1–7 (2012)

Tandem Solar Cells: Perovskite-Silicon
• In roof integrated installations where space is
limited, the way to increase output is to improve the
efficiency → adding a perovskite solar cell on top of
c-Si cell is a good strategy (total efficiency can be
improved to as high as 30%)

• Perovskite (UV-blue portion) + Silicon (Infrared

Silicon Solar Cell
portion) can absorb more of the incident sunlight

Spectral Irradiance (Wm-2 nm-1)

Spectral Irradiance (Wm-2 nm-1)

External Quantum Effciency

External Quantum Effciency

1.75 1.75 Solar Irradiance AM1.5 G
Silicon Solar cell
1.50 1.50 Perovskite Solar cell

1.25 1.25

1.00 1.00

0.75 0.75

0.50 0.50

0.25 0.25

0.00 0.00
400 600 800 1000 400 600 800 1000
Wavelength (nm) Wavelength (nm)
Perovskite (blue) + Silicon (red) can
Silicon Only
absorb more of the incident Sunlight 81
(image courtesy of Prof Subodh Mhaisalkar, ERI@N)
82
Summary and Outlook
• Perovskite: Exceptional Semiconductors: Novel photophysics,
Outstanding optoelectronic properties

• Perovskite solar technology is still young but has enormous

potential.

• Potential applications:
- Tandem solar cells (perovskite-Si)
- Building Integrated Photovoltaics (BIPV),
- Consumer electronics, wearables (where flexibility feature is
a key added-value)

• Challenges:
Cost, Capacity
Scale-up processes
Reliability, stability
Toxicity