Scientists at the Queen Mary University of London have formed a new partnership with solar start-up Power Roll to improve quality control in perovskite solar film manufacturing.
The partners will be working on a solution to to defects in perovskites, which is referred to as an “in-situ optical analysis to provide fast accurate data for quality control,” first developed by Queen Mary’s Dr. Stoichko Dimitrov. Power Roll will be the first to apply the technology in an industrial setting. The start-up uses a combination of microgrooves and vacuum forming to make film which is less than a millimeter thick and 25 times lighter than even the lightest silicon panels. Creating such thin film at scale makes quality control especially tough. Each individual solar cell Power Roll makes is 1/50th of the width of a human hair – far too small to be inspected visually. The team at Queen Mary and Power Roll aim to solve this.
Dr. Dave Barwick, technical manager at Power Roll, commented on the technology: “We’re making solar that goes where other solar solutions can’t, and we’re doing it without using rare and precious earth materials. Queen Mary’s expertise in optical analysis will help us scale up production by ensuring every microscopic solar cell is of the highest quality.”
Dr. Stoichko Dimitrov added: “The technology will analyze how light interacts with the material as it’s being produced, thereby providing essential data for monitoring and improving the quality of the film produced in real time. This will enable PowerRoll to scale up production and make perovskite film a reality.”
The project, funded by Innovate UK, will see Queen Mary hire a post-doctoral research associate to help translate research into scalable production methods.
