Longi claims world record-breaking 34.6% efficiency for perovskite-silicon tandem solar cell
Longi claims world record-breaking 34.6% efficiency for perovskite-silicon tandem solar cell
The European Solar Test Installation (ESTI) has confirmed Longi's achievement of a world record-breaking efficiency rating of 34.6% for a perovskite-silicon tandem solar cell.
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The article could benefit from some additional context; is this a one off thing or can we expect to see this in mainstream solar installations? If yes, then kind of time scales are we talking about? What is the cost difference between this type of panel and "mainstream" panels? More information on Longi would also be helpful.
I dont know this work, but have had a hand in some solar cell research (nanomaterials development), so can give a little context. This is a "one off" in so much as it will be centimeters sized lab based sample, although it has been repearedto verify. The current cost difference is astronomical versus mainstream (silicon) panels, but that's typical of new discoveries. To be more exact, this is TRL 4 (technology readiness level 4) which is a scale that goes up to 9. Things only start getting cheap as you get towards the top. As for what the expected price of these materials would be, we don't usually know for sure, although as this is a tandem cell it must be more expensive than mainstream as it literally builds a perovskite cell on top of a silicon one. They will never be used for mainstream - this is a specialist material.
The perovskite itself might make it as a general use solar cell. They have good efficiencies and you don't have to make pure silicon (which is a bitch) and can in theory make them cheap and easy. As for time frame, I'm a bit of a skeptic it will ever be really used as there are a couple of issues this tech needs to address before it's viable (#1, they degrade in air and encapsulating them adds new issues) and we already build silicon factories so that is soooo cheap versus building new factories to make long-term-cheaper cells. Factories are expensive. But in theory, anyone could push it to the mainstream within a decade.
Thank you for this! Nothing wrong with "tech demo" type initiatives, but they need to be clearly labelled as such.
What caught my attention was that this was likely a "centimeters sized lab based sample" and "they degrade in air"). These two factors make it seem like, while this is interesting tech achievement, it's not really viable for mainstream use anytime soon.