Flexible thin film CIGS solar cell on polymer substrate developed at Empa
Scientists have further boosted the energy conversion efficiency of flexible solar cells made of copper indium gallium (di)selenide (also known as CIGS) to a new world record of 18.7% - a significant improvement overt he previous record of 17.6% achieved by the same team in June 2010. It's all about the money. To make solar electricity affordable on a large scale, scientists and engineers worldwide have long been trying to develop a low-cost solar cell, which is both highly efficient and easy tomanufacture with high throughput. Now a team at EMPA has made a major step forward. "The new record value for flexible CIGS solar cells of 18.7% nearly closes the "efficiency gap" to solar cells based on polycrystalline silicon (Si) wafers or CIGS thin film cells on glass", says Tiwari, leader of the research group. He is convinced that "flexible and lightweight CIGS solar cells with efficiencies comparable to the "best-in-class" will have excellent potential to bring about a paradigm shift and to enable low-cost solar electricity in the near future." One major advantage of flexible high-performance CIGS solar cells is the potential to lower manufacturing costs through roll-to-roll processing while at the same time offering a much higher efficiency than the ones currently on the market. What's more, such lightweight and flexible solar modules offer additional cost benefits in terms of transportation, installation, structural frames for the modules etc., i.e. they significantly reduce the so-called "balance of system" costs.
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