VIPV

The Dutch government has drafted a public proposal to support the production of heterojunction and perovskite-silicon tandem modules, as well as building- and vehicle-integrated PV panels, with a maximum allocation of €70 million ($75.1 million) per solar manufacturing project. Rijksdienst voor Ondernemend Nederland (RVO), the state-run agency that manages the SDE++ program for renewable energy in the Netherlands, has publicly proposed the idea of supporting the production of solar panels, storage systems and electrolyzers. The new incentive scheme, “Investeringssubsidie maakindustrie klimaatneutrale economie” (IMKE), will fund a portion of the capital expenditure needed to build factories for the three clean energy technologies.

The RVO said that the incentives for the production of PV panels will be limited to products for building-integrated (BIPV) and vehicle-integrated (VIPV) applications, as well as heterojunction modules or perovskite-silicon tandem panels.

Oxford PV has announced that its perovskite-on-silicon tandem solar cells will be deployed for the first time on the race car of the Top Dutch Solar Racing team for the upcoming Bridgestone World Solar Challenge. 

Taking place between the 22nd and 29th of October 2023, the competition brings some of the world’s greatest scientific and engineering talent to Australia to travel 3,000 kilometers in a vehicle powered only by the energy of the sun. University-affiliated teams push the limits of technological innovation and travel the outback in solar-powered vehicles that they have designed, engineered and ultimately built themselves.

Researchers from The University of Sydney, University of New South Wales, Macquarie University and University of Technology Sydney have demonstrated efficient perovskite solar cells (PSCs) on steel substrates.

The team explained that steel, being flexible and conductive, can itself can act as both a substrate and an electrode for either large-area-monolithic-panel or smaller-area-singular single-junction or multi-junction cell fabrication. The reported cells could be used for building-integrated PV (BIPV), vehicle-integrated solar (VIPV), or other design-integrated photovoltaics for terrestrial or space applications.

South Korea’s automotive giant, Hyundai Motor Group, recently unveiled several new nanotechnologies for future mobility at the Nano Tech Day 2023 event in Seoul. 

Besides inventions like a “self-healing polymer coating” that enables the car to repair its own scratches, perovskite/silicon tandem solar cells were also introduced. It was said that Hyundai Motor Group believes that by applying tandem solar cells to areas that receive direct sunlight, such as the engine compartment cover, top panel, and doors of eco-friendly vehicles, it will be possible to generate enough electricity for daily driving.

The SolarNL initiative, designed to strengthen solar manufacturing in the Netherlands, has been awarded a subsidy by the Dutch government’s National Growth Fund. The project will receive EUR 312 million (USD 340m) from the government, of which EUR 135 million awarded immediately and EUR 177 million conditionally, as well as a EUR-100-million loan.

The SolarNL program groups nine Dutch solar technology companies - Solarge, MCPV, HyET Solar, Compoform, Exasun, Energyra, Lightyear Layer, IM Efficiency and Taylor - and research organizations, targeting the development and large-scale production of circular integrated solar cells and panels in the Netherlands.

It will seek to develop and industrialize three innovative photovoltaic (PV) technologies: high-efficiency silicon heterojunction cells (HJT), flexible perovskite films, and PV products for integration into buildings and automotive applications.

MCPV said (on Linkedin) that the support includes its first GW-scale HJT cell manufacturing facility in Europe.

The overall budget of the program is EUR 898 million, of which EUR 586 million is private financing.

A team of researchers at the National Centre for Photovoltaic Research and Education (NCPRE) at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IITB) has fabricated a semi-transparent perovskite solar cell (PSC) that, by combining it with a silicon-based solar cell, has demonstrated an efficiency of more than 26% for such a cell.

The team at IIT Bombay has addressed the stability issue by combining their PSC with a silicon solar cell in a tandem configuration. Combining the two different types of solar cells allows the device to convert more of the light falling on it into electricity. Apart from the higher efficiency, the tandem architecture also provides greater stability to the device, while driving its overall lifetime costs low.

EneCoat Technologies and Toyota Motor Corporation have announced that they will work together to develop and commercialize automotive perovskite solar cells (PSCs) with the common goal of "contributing to the realization of carbon neutrality". The high efficiency, thin form factor and light weight make PSCs suitable for the automotive industry.

EneCoat is a start-up company established in 2018 based on research results from Atsushi Wakamiya's laboratory at the Institute for Chemical Research, Kyoto University. It has developed material and deposition technologies for high-efficiency perovskite solar cells, and has successfully developed film-type perovskite solar cells with high output (module conversion efficiency of 19.4% as of April 2023). It is also participating in the Green Innovation Fund Project, one of the government's industrial policies aiming for carbon neutrality by 2050.

Researchers from NREL, University of Wisconsin—Stout and Swift Solar have reported perovskite-based thermochromic windows that reduce energy load and carbon emission in buildings. The team calculated and fabricated a perovskite-based technology with excellent transition temperatures for building energy savings. 

The use of thermochromic windows in office buildings improves energy efficiency across all climate zones in the United States by modulating the temperature inside, leading to a massive savings, according to the research effort led by the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).

Researchers from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Jodhpur, India have developed a series of perovskite-based catalysts capable of efficiently producing hydrogen under ambient conditions. The end application of this research could be in the automotive and energy sectors, according to the statement issued by IIT Jodhpur. The developed catalysts are lanthanides-based perovskite nanocomposite materials for artificial photosynthesis. In the patented method, the researchers have used natural sunlight to convert water into hydrogen and oxygen, using a recyclable catalyst based on low-cost, simple transition metal.

The research team screened over 100 catalyst combinations to develop five sets of catalysts that gave high hydrogen production under sunlight. The catalysts work for wastewater, saline water and brackish water. They are recyclable and can be used multiple times. Lanthanide-based catalytic systems gave the best results and were found effective in continuous pure hydrogen production for 7.5 hours.

Researchers from Peking University, China Automotive Technology and Research Center, Beijing Institute of Technology and Jiangnan University recently demonstrated the ability of tuning the Fermi level of the hole transport layer (HTL) to reduce the energy level difference (Schottky barrier) between HTLs and Cu. In addition, the team identified that the balance of energy level difference between HTL and adjacent layers (including perovskite and Cu) is crucial to efficient carrier transportation and photovoltaic performance improvement in the PSCs.

The team's effort was aimed at addressing the challenge of developing low-cost and stable metal electrodes, which could be very important for mass production of perovskite solar cells (PSCs). As an earth-abundant element, Cu becomes an alternative candidate to replace noble metal electrodes such as Au and Ag, due to its comparable physiochemical properties with simultaneously good stability and low cost. However, the undesirable band alignment associated with the device architecture impedes the exploration of efficient Cu-based n-i-p PSCs.