[Los Angeles, CA, USA] Swedish developer and manufacturer of thin film CIGS solar cells, Midsummer, has collaborated with researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) to develop a 4-terminal perovskite-CIGS tandem solar cell. This breakthrough cell is based on a perovskite top layer optimized for integration with Midsummer's CIGS cells, which are used in their commercial suite of Building-Integrated Photovoltaics (BIPV) products.
The cell has shown impressive efficiency of 24.9 percent as a 4-terminal device architecture. It consists of a top layer of wide bandgap perovskite cell and a bottom layer of the CIGS cell. The aim of the research is to develop a two-terminal perovskite-CIGS cell that will be highly competitive and suitable for mass production.
Midsummer's breakthrough production process, developed using their DUO machine, has shown the feasibility of building a tandem cell. The DUO production system is able to provide high-performance CIGS solar cells with dimensions of 156 mm x 156 mm on a flexible stainless steel substrate, which is ideally suited for subsequent processing of perovskite films on the company's current BIPV product suite.
“We feel fortunate to be working with Professor Yang’s group at UCLA which has demonstrated key advances in perovskites,” said Leon Chiu, President of Pioneer Materials, Inc., a key supplier for compound sputtering targets used in Midsummer’s novel processing for CIGS on stainless steel. “Integrating Midsummer’s production-proven CIGS processing with Yang’s Lab tailored perovskite shows a clear path toward expanding the reach of BIPV by improving efficiency and lowering costs.”
“Perovskite-CIGS tandem cells have great future potential and Midsummer’s solar panel design has by far the best conditions for building a commercial product for this type of solar panel, e.g since it contains a diode between each solar cell,” comments Sven Lindström, CEO of Midsummer.
Professor Yang Yang added, “We are thrilled to have this opportunity to work with Midsummer and PMI. Our ultimate goal is to demonstrate two-terminal perovskite/CIGS tandem cells, suitable for mass production.”
This successful collaboration is a significant step toward achieving highly efficient, cost-effective, and commercially viable perovskite-CIGS tandem solar cells for the renewable energy industry.
