Published September 14, 2022 | Version v1
Preprint Open

Towards market commercialization: Lifecycle economic and environmental evaluation of scalable perovskite solar cells

  • 1. Hasselt University
  • 2. Flemish Institute for Technological Research (VITO), DOW
  • 3. Karlsruhe Institute of Technology
  • 4. Solaronix SA
  • 5. Flemish Institute for Technological Research (VITO)
  • 6. Hasselt University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • 7. Hasselt University, IMEC

Description

Many economic and environmental studies on novel perovskite solar cells (PSCs), published ex post the development stage to investigate the market competitiveness, have focused on laboratory-scale PSC architectures that are not amenable for upscaling. In this paper, we evaluate the market potential and environmental sustainability of a scalable carbon-electrode-based PSC by benchmarking it to the market dominating c-Si photovoltaics and CIGS thin film photovoltaics. The analysis covers the PSCs full lifecycle, at the module and system levels (residential and utility scale), and is based on realistic annual energy output data derived from energy yield calculations. We find that this PSC can produce electricity at low cost (3–6 €cents/kWh), with lowest energy payback (0.6–0.8 years) and greenhouse gas emissions (15–25g CO2 eq./kWh) compared with grid-connected PV market alternatives, assuming 25 years of lifetime, expected PV system cost reductions, and PSC module recycling and refurbishment.

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Additional details

Funding

European Commission
PERCISTAND - Development of all thin-film PERovskite on CIS TANDem photovoltaics 850937