In what is said to be a "major milestone toward commercialization", Solliance partners TNO, imec and the Eindhoven University of Technology demonstrated encapsulated perovskite solar modules fabricated using industrial processes that withstand three established lifetime tests, i.e. the light soak test, the damp-heat test and the thermal cycling test. It is for the first time this milestone is passed with scaled perovskite solar modules prepared by research organizations.

The efficiency and versatility of perovskite solar modules has generated a lot of interest in this novel solar energy technology. However, concerns have been raised about the stability of perovskite solar modules since the early devices, reported a decade ago, were only stable for minutes. By passing three rigorous aging tests, Solliance and its industrial partners take a major step towards commercialization of this novel solar technology.

For the purpose of decarbonizing the energy-mix, which is becoming a priority challenge for European countries among others, European universities, research institutes and industries involved in the development of perovskite technologies have agreed on the creation of a collaborative platform: the EPKI.

This initiative is dedicated to gathering all significant parties working in this field and is pursuing the following objectives:

• Raise the awareness on perovskite based photovoltaics by conveying a common vision through the editing of a common European perovskite whitepaper,
• Support and initiate next generation PV industrial initiatives,
• Facilitate joint-research programs and synergies among universities, institutes and companies.

Researchers at the Energy Research Center of the Netherlands (ECN) have developed a bifacial tandem solar cell with a conversion efficiency of 30.2%. The new cell device ' created with Dutch consortium Solliance ' was made by applying a newly developed perovskite cell on top of an industrial bifacial crystalline silicon version.

This approach, according to the scientists, enables a significantly higher power conversion efficiency as one cell is optimized for high energy photons, and the other low energy particles. 'The tandem device proposed here uses a four-terminal configuration, thus having separate circuits for the top and bottom cells that allow for dynamic fine tuning and optimization of the energy yield,' the creators of the cell wrote. The cell is also said to be better able to capture light on its front and rear sides by responding to the variability of incident light through its electronic design.

Solliance Solar Research has announced a major accomplishment in the thermal stability of perovskite technology. The thermal stability was tested over a period of 3.000 hours. After this thermal stress test, the cell performance showed 93% of the initial performance.

Mehrdad Najafi, researcher at Solliance Solar Research, who will be presenting the work at the EU PVSEC in Belgium on September 27th, states: "Perovskite solar cells have attracted great attention due to their high power conversion efficiency Demonstrated stability and scale-ability, two very important topics within the Solliance collaboration, are the next steps towards successful commercialization of this technology. Our recent results show that it is possible to achieve stable perovskite solar cells upon prolonged exposure to thermal stress. After a further full-stack optimization and the introduction of a metal oxide layer by means of Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD), the thermal stability improved drastically compared with our previous reference: instead of losing over 50% of its performance after 100 hours at 85oC, we now demonstrate only 7% of performance loss after 3.000 hours at 85oC. This is an important stepping stone towards full IEC compliance".

imec, the world-leading research and innovation hub, recently presented an impressive thin-film tandem solar cell at the EU PVSEC conference. The cell consists of a top perovskite cell developed by imec within the partnerships of EnergyVille and Solliance, and a bottom CIGS cell from the Centre for Solar Energy and Hydrogen Research (ZSW, Stuttgart, Germany). The tandem cell resulting from this collaboration achieves a record efficiency of 24.6%.

The perovskite top cell in the tandem uses light in the visible part of the solar spectrum, while the light in the near-IR spectrum that passes through the perovskite cell is harvested by the underlying CIGS cell. In this way, the tandem cell significantly outperforms the stand-alone perovskite and CIGS cells. Moreover, both perovskite and CIGS cells are thin-film solar cells, paving the way to high efficiency flexible solar cells and building integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) solutions.

Imec, the leading research and innovation hub in nanoelectronics, energy and digital technology, within the partnership of EnergyVille, announced a record result for its 4-terminal perovskite/silicon tandem photovoltaic cell. In fact, with a reported power conversion efficiency of 27.1%, the new tandem cell tops the most efficient standalone silicon solar cell. Further careful engineering of the Perovskite material will bring efficiencies over 30% in reach.

Imec's new record tandem cell uses a 0.13 cm² spin-coated perovskite cell developed within the Solliance cooperation, stacked on top of a 4 cm² industrial interdigitated back-contact (IBC) silicon cell in a 4-terminal configuration, which is known to have a higher annual energy yield compared to a 2-terminal configuration. Additionally, scaling up the tandem device by using a 4 cm² perovskite module on a 4 cm² IBC silicon cell, a tandem efficiency of 25.3% was achieved, surpassing the stand-alone efficiency of the silicon cell.

Solliance announced a new record stabilized average cell performance of 14.5% for its large thin-film perovskite photovoltaic modules on glass. The efficiency was measured on an aperture area of 144 cm².

The perovskite module was realized on a commercial 6x6 inch² glass substrate, a size comparable to standard commercial silicon solar cells. The substrate is provided with a transparent conductor, by applying three consecutive slot die coating processes and using a newly developed annealing process. The metal top electrode was evaporated. Twenty-four cells were series-connected through optimized laser-based scribes. Up to 95.3% of the modules area is covered with active material, resulting in a stabilized module efficiency of 13.8%.

The recent Silicon PV/nPV conference in Lausanne, Switzerland, saw Solliance's announcement on the achievement of a major milestone in perovskite technology for application in future industrial high efficiency tandem photovoltaic cells and modules. Solliance announced realizing a perovskite cell that combines good cell efficiency with a very high near infrared transparency of 93%.

Also at the conference, ECN shows that when this perovskite cell is mechanically stacked on a 6 inch² silicon bottom cell with its proprietary MWT-SHJ (metal-wrap-through silicon heterojunction) design, 26.3% efficiency is achieved, an increase of 3.6% points over the efficiency of the directly illuminated silicon cell laminate.

Solliance has achieved a new world record for Perovskite Solar Cell technology demonstrated on industrially applicable Roll-to-Roll (R2R) processes of 13.5% conversion efficiency at cell level. The group stressed that the records were achieved in a factory setting, using an industrially scalable process.

Solliance has achieved the conversion efficiency of 13.5% and module-level aperture area conversion efficiency of 12.2% for perovskite-based photovoltaics using industrially-applicable, roll-to-roll production processes. By further optimizing and re-validating processes that were earlier developed buy Solliance, the performance at both the cell and module level have been improved.

Imec, a leading research and innovation hub in nano electronics, energy and digital technologies, and partner in Solliance, announced that it has improved its 4x4cm² perovskite module achieving a certified conversion efficiency of 12.4%.

The module efficiency was measured under long-term maximum power point (MPP) tracking, testifying to its exceptional stability. At Solliance, this perovskite technology is developed with industrially-applicable processes and with a view towards a rapid market introduction of this promising source of renewable energy.