Perovskite-Based Solar Cells

摘要

Photovoltaic (PV) cells that convert sunlight directly into electricity are becoming increasingly important in the world's renewable energy mix. The cumulative world PV installations reached around 100 GW_p (giga-watts) (7) by the end of 2012. Some 85% use crystalline Si, with the rest being polycrystalline thin film cells, mostly cadmium telluride/cadmium sulfide ones. Thin-film cells tend to be cheaper to make with a shorter energy payback time. However, they do have the disadvantage, one that may become crucial when considering the terawatt range, that most of them contain rare elements like tellurium (as rare as gold), indium, and gallium. A newcomer to the PV field (2) has rapidly reached conversion efficiencies of more than 15% (see the figure).