Environmental analysis of perovskites and other relevant solar cell technologies in a tandem configuration

Abstract

A PKSn,Pb/PKPb tandem was found to be the most promising PV technology for lowering the environmental impacts from solar PVs.

The balance between efficiency, stability and environmental impacts in perovskite solar cells: a review

“…The results for 1kWh Functional Unit with 1 year lifetime showed that the small amount of toxic lead(II)halide included in the solar cell (0.001% in weight) poses less environmental and health risks than the processing of the methylammonium halide [17]. This result is confirmed by a study on the toxicity impacts of the lead used in the formation of the light absorber layer, that were found to be negligible by Celik et al [26,27]. Other studies still found emission of lead to air during production, and emission to water during end-of-life, that are the main contributors to the human toxicity category of impacts, and recommend more research into worker exposure and worker safety measures during processing in a future large scale factory [20].…”

“…Manufacturing two terminal tandem cells reduces up to 30% of the environmental impacts equivalent to two single junction devices, mainly because of the reduced use of glass. Different tandem options have been fabricated and analysed: perovskite (with Pb) on top of inorganic Si, CIGS and CZTS bottom cell and a full perovskite tandem (SnPb/Pb), with extrapolated energy pay back time (EPBT) of 13, 7, 2, and 1 months, respectively, and the full perovskite (SnPb/Pb) structure has the potential to be the most environmentally friendly technology, but can only compete with Si technology if efficiencies of 30% and 16 year lifetime are reached [27]. For now the perovskite on top of Si is the technological option which is being rapidly developed, including a company (Oxford PV Ltd) which may commercialize modules very soon [164].…”

“…In this article, the most standard approach has been used to select references and if necessary to convert to units (FU or energy-related) which allows for a fair comparison of results [175]. Several LCA studies have been published recently, starting with the historical review of perovskite solar cell technology by Jung et alThis review included some information about environmental impacts [23], some focused on a specific process or device architecture [15,17], others on comparison between lead or lead-free alternatives [18], and more recently with a focus on tandem devices [20,21,27].…”

From Lead Halide Perovskites to Lead‐Free Metal Halide Perovskites and Perovskite Derivatives

“…At this stage, Pb halide perovskite solar cells present a great potential to become the leader of the next-generation photovoltaic technologies. In particular, the relatively low levelized costs of energy (LCOE), [17,18] short energy payback time (EPBT), [19][20][21] and small life-cycle environmental impacts [20][21][22][23] enabled by the low-temperature solution processing and usage of ultrathin absorber layer make them a viable technology to compete with other more established photovoltaic technologies in the market.…”

Realizing High Efficiency over 20% of Low‐Bandgap Pb–Sn‐Alloyed Perovskite Solar Cells by In Situ Reduction of Sn4+

“…Ultimately, the champion PSCs using a low-bandgap (FASnI 3 ) 0.6 (MAPbI 3 ) 0.4 perovskite film with Sn 4þ reduction show a high V oc of 0.843 V corresponding to a V oc loss as low as 0.397 eV and a high fill factor of 80.34%, leading to an impressive PCE of 20.7%, which is one of the few instances of a PCE over 20% for low-bandgap mixed Pb-Sn PSCs to date.The highest certified power conversion efficiency (PCE) of PSCs has reached 25.2% [1] for organic-inorganic halide perovskite solar cells (PSCs) with a medium bandgap of %1.5 eV, approaching its Shockley-Queisser (S-Q) limit. [2] A proven method to break the S-Q limit is to fabricate perovskite-perovskite tandem solar cells, [3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17] which combines a wide-bandgap front cell (1.7-1.9 eV) and a low-bandgap bottom cell (1.1-1.3 eV) with a predicted maximum PCE over 40%. [16,17] In addition to the tandem cell, the Sn-Pb-alloyed perovskite with a more suitable bandgap of %1.24 eV has a higher theoretical efficiency limit for a single-junction cell.Many efforts have been devoted to improving the PCE of low-bandgap mixed Pb-Sn PSCs.…”