Scientists Introduce Breakthrough Solar Power Design That’s Much Cheaper Than Traditional Solar Panels: ‘The Holy Grail’

Scientists have created perovskite solar cells that could theoretically last as long as traditional silicon-based solar cells, LiveScience reports. It could be a breakthrough in clean energy.

Perovskites, which refer to a material with a crystalline structure that naturally occurs in calcium titanium oxide, have been called a “miracle material,” “the holy grail,” and “like Michael Jordan on the basketball court” by clean energy researchers for their potentially lower costs and higher production rates, as well as their high efficiency in harvesting solar energy. However, they are much less durable than traditional silicon, meaning that most of their (still impressive) applications to date have involved perovskite-silicon tandems.

But now, Rice University researchers have developed a new method for creating perovskite solar cells that addresses the stability and durability issues. By treating the perovskite with a solution of the precursor formamidinium iodide, the researchers created “ultrastable” cells, as detailed by LiveScience.

“Perovskite solar cells are kind of the holy grail of this new solar cell technology. That’s because perovskites can theoretically be produced much cheaper than inorganic solar cells like silicon or gallium arsenide,” said Isaac Metcalf, a graduate student in materials science and nanoengineering at Rice University, according to the news platform.

“The reason is that they can be processed in solution at low temperatures. Basically, you can take a perovskite precursor ink and spread it on a piece of glass and then heat it up and then you have a perovskite.”

The results of this research could mean that solar cells will be equally or more efficient (meaning they can collect more solar energy in the same amount of time using the same amount of space), cheaper and less energy-intensive to produce, and will require fewer non-renewable resources (such as silicon) — while theoretically lasting just as long.

As our planet continues to overheat due to our dependence on dirty energy sources like gas and oil, it is important to rely on clean, renewable energy sources like wind and sun instead. Advances in solar technology that allow us to maximize the efficiency of solar cells are making this future increasingly possible.

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