Agrivoltaics

France-based Armor Group has acquired a 20% stake in French solar module maker HoloSolis. 

In 2025, HoloSolis plans to open a TOPCon PV cell and panel factory in France. At full capacity from 2027, the factory is expected to employ 1,700 people and produce 10 million modules per year, for a total capacity of 5 GW per year. HoloSolis is also working on the next generation of solar panels and the perovskite-silicon tandem cells.

The perovskite solar industry is emerging and becoming a vibrant industry, with dozens of companies that are developing and starting to produce perovskite-based and perovskite-enhanced solar panels, for many applications.

While the industry is still at an early stage, we can see that almost half (43%) of the active perovskite developers are focused on solutions for outdoor applications – mainly roof top and utility scale applications – for generating electricity on a large scale, a replacement for current silicon-based solutions. While this is a challenging area (requires low cost, high performance and very high stability), the size of this market is large and proven. Perovskite has some inherent advantages in this area – low weight, low cost, high return on investment, high efficiency and excellent light absorption properties.

Silicon-based solar cells currently dominate the solar market. It is a proven technology, with established manufacturing processes. However, it is also quite expensive to produce, yields rigid cells and has an estimated efficiency limit of around 29%. In recent years, perovskite-based solar technologies have been drawing a lot of attention, and many academics and companies believe they are the future of the solar industry.

Perovskite Solar Cell (PSC) technology is a photovoltaic (PV) technology based on the use of perovskite materials, mostly in the light-absorbing layers of the cell. There are many types of perovskite materials, and several processes used to deposit these materials to create efficient solar panels. PSCs have potential for creating solar panels that are easily deposited onto most surfaces, including flexible and textured ones. They can also be lightweight, cheap to produce, and more efficient than silicon-based solar cells (efficiencies in the lab have already crossed 30%). 

The major advantages of perovskite-based solar cells are factors of performance, applicability and sustainability:

Researchers from CNR-IMM,CNR-IPCB, CNR-NANOTEC, Università Degli Studi di Messina and the University of Basel have shown that lead leakage can be prevented by applying a transparent titanium dioxide (TiO₂) sponge in a semitransparent solar cell. The device has demonstrated comparable efficiency to semi-transparent perovskite devices and has an average visible transmittance (AVT) of 31.4%.

The team designed the solar cell for applications such as building-integrated photovoltaics (BIPV) and agrivoltaics, in which the potential lead leakage can be seen as a serious public environmental and health risk source. 

Italian solar company, FuturaSun, has acquired Solertix, a start-up specialized in perovskite solar cell research and upscaling for industrial applications.

This acquisition represents a major investment for FuturaSun in scientific research and in the development of innovative technologies. Alessandro Barin, CEO of FuturaSun, emphasizes the strategic importance of this step, stating, “Perovskite is the future of high-efficiency photovoltaics, and in this specific R&D segment, we couldn’t afford not to be key players, working alongside those who are dedicated to scientific research at the highest academic levels.”

Researchers from EMPA (Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology), University of Cantabria and National Tsing Hua University have created a bifacial perovskite-CIGS tandem solar cell and developed a new low-temperature production process resulting in record efficiencies of 19.8% for front and 10.9% for rear illumination.

The idea is collecting direct sunlight, as well as its reflection via the rear end of the solar cell, which should increase the yield of energy the cell produces. Potential applications are, for instance, building-integrated photovoltaics, agrivoltaics – the simultaneous use of areas of land for both photovoltaic power generation and agriculture – and vertically or high-tilt installed solar modules on high-altitude grounds.

TubeSolar, together with the Centre for Solar Energy and Hydrogen Research Baden-Württemberg (ZSW), has reached an important milestone on the way to industrial production of its novel photovoltaic technology: an efficiency record of 14% was achieved on solar films in the industrially suitable "roll-to-roll" process. This was achieved as part of TubeSolar's perovskite research activities. 

In the process, the partners deposited all layers - with the exception of the front and rear contacts - using slot die. The speed of the coating process was over one metre per minute. The combination of this industrially suitable, fast production process and the high efficiency was referred to as 'groundbreaking' by the Companies. The flexible solar cells are used for the production of tubular photovoltaic modules, which can be used in agri-photovoltaics, among other applications.

Ascent Solar Technologies, a developer and manufacturer of flexible thin-film photovoltaic solutions, has announced the signing of a Joint Development Agreement with German agrivoltaic thin-film solar tube maker, TubeSolar, to pursue the Agricultural-photovoltaics/Agrivoltaics (APV) market.

It was indicated that this JDA is a multi-million-dollar, long-term supply agreement, forming a strategic partnership between Ascent Solar and TubeSolar. This JDA includes (i) long-term supplier of customized PV ('PV Foils') for TubeSolar, (ii) Non-Recurring Engineering Fee ('NRE Fee') of up to $4 Million, payable by TubeSolar to Ascent Solar in three parts, (iii) establishment of a joint venture entity to develop a new manufacturing facility located in Germany ('JV FAB'), (iv) the Company will benefit from milestone payments by TubeSolar of up to $13.5 Million, and (v) joint development efforts in next generation, high efficiency CIGS-Perovskite tandem PV cells.