Are Technological Developments Improving the Environmental Sustainability of Photovoltaic Electricity?

Abstract

Innovation in photovoltaics (PV) is mostly driven by the cost per kilowatt ratio, making it easy to overlook environmental impacts of technological enhancements during early research and development stages. As PV technology developers introduce novel materials and manufacturing methods, the well‐studied environmental profile of conventional silicon‐based PV may change considerably. Herein, existing trends and hotspots across different types of emerging PV technologies are investigated through a systematic review and meta‐analysis of life‐cycle assessments (LCAs). To incorporate as many data points as possible, a comprehensive harmonization procedure is applied, producing over 600 impact data points for organic, perovskite (PK), dye‐sensitized, tandem, silicon, and other thin‐film cells. How the panel and balance of system components affect environmental footprints in comparable installations is also investigated and discussed. Despite the large uncertainties and variabilities in the underlying LCA data and models, the harmonized results show clear positive trends across the sector. Seven potential hotspots are identified for specific PV technologies and impact categories. The analysis offers a high‐level guidance for technology developers to avoid introducing undesired environmental trade‐offs as they advance to make PV more competitive in the energy markets.

Comparison of Perovskite Solar Cells with other Photovoltaics Technologies from the Point of View of Life Cycle Assessment

“…[37] In addition, PSCs were compared with the rest of PV technologies in some reviews. [25,36,38] A couple of works were focused on comparing the toxicity risk of lead from PSC with toxicity of the electricity grid, mostly based on fossil fuels. [106,107] Toxicity potential of electricity from lead PSC over a 20 year operational lifetime would be %20 times lower than that of grid electricity.…”

“…The reason is the shorter lifetime assumed for the PSCs, 1-5 years against 25-30 years for the rest of technologies, making them environmentally uncompetitive if the current lifetimes are not improved. [25,36,38,49,50,52,64,65,72] In this article, the functional unit kW p is selected to avoid the consideration of the lifetime. Results for the GWP and CED of the PSCs reviewed are in Table 1 and 2 for singlejunction and tandem PSCs, respectively.…”

“…The LCA methodology has been used to analyze different aspects of PSC, as it has been discussed in previous reviews. [19,21,25,[33][34][35][36][37][38] Here, we present a review of the LCA of PSC, treating distinct issues than in previous reviews, focusing in the comparison of PSCs with currently commercial PV technologies. These distinguished aspects treated herein comprise the difference between laboratory-based and industrial-based simulated PSCs, harmonized comparison of PSCs with siliconbased, CdTe and CIGS PV technologies using a functional unit independent of the lifetime; consequently, stability issues are not considered, as it is field experiencing a continuous progress, and currently, there is no clear benchmark.…”

Environmental impacts of III–V/silicon photovoltaics: life cycle assessment and guidance for sustainable manufacturing

“…For the use phase, we considered a system lifetime of 30 years with no degradation, in line with most LCA studies of conventional silicon PV systems. While stability has been a sensitive aspect in LCA studies of some emerging PV technologies such as organic and perovskites, 25 III-V multi-junction solar cells are well known for applications in space where reliability is a key concern and significant tests are performed before a product is qualified for a space mission. 26 III-V multijunction cells are also significantly less sensitive to impurities since the absorber thickness is only on the order of 1-3 mm compared to 100-200 mm for Si.…”

Review of State of the Art Recycling Methods in the Context of Dye Sensitized Solar Cells

“…Which seems true at first glance, but the real problem is probably not the energy demand, but the huge throughput by our linear economy that consumes or demands all this energy. Therefore, instead of improving energy production, we should become more effective with our material use and thus reduce energy demand [78,79]. In addition, due to the pressure to perform in DSSC efficiency research, the so-called reproducibility crisis is an acute problem.…”