Roll-to-roll fabricated perovskite solar cells under ambient room conditions • Hacker News Board

Re: Roll-to-roll fabricated perovskite solar cells under ambient room conditions

#51

Post by mikepurvis » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 3:08 PM UTC

jandrese wrote: post #45

dr_dshiv wrote: post #29

Here is the graph of exponential installed solar capacity [1]. Like Moore’s law, continuous technological innovation and investment will be required to keep the pace. We just hit 1 terawatt— and doubling time seems to be about every 3 years. So… 1,2,4,8,16,32,64,128,512,1028, 2056 terawatts in 30 years? With 20% capacity, that’s equivalent to >300,000 Million Tons of Oil (MToE) per year. Current global energy consump…

Ahh, the classic case of seeing the bottom half of an S curve and projecting it out to infinite exponential growth. The number of times things have experienced infinite exponential growth in all of history starting from the Big Bang: 0.

Sure, but until we see the inflection point we can't know how much longer the bottom half of the S curve lasts— it might be 2, 5, 10 years, or it might have already passed; either way we'll only know in retrospect.

Those different options make a big difference on how much PV is part of the long term global energy picture.

Re: Roll-to-roll fabricated perovskite solar cells under ambient room conditions

#52

Post by photonbeam » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 3:10 PM UTC

londons_explore wrote: post #7

The market need for cheaper solar cells seems to have evaporated, since the vast majority of the cost of solar projects these days is always in labour/land/wiring/inverters/grid connection/maintenance contracts. That means saving a bit of money on the panels in return for lower efficiency is never a good deal.

The are plenty of places with really low labor costs that would love cheaper panels

Re: Roll-to-roll fabricated perovskite solar cells under ambient room conditions

#53

Post by beanjuice » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 3:13 PM UTC

My two cents having formerly worked in perovskites trying to upscale the process:

Perovskites are exciting (or were exciting) because they have a high theoretical efficiency, are relatively simple to prepare, and the "worst" component in them is lead (an incredibly abundant material). The big problem with them is that they are famously horrifically unstable in ambient conditions.

Roll-to-roll processing means that you can fabricate them in mass scale. Ambient means that they claim to have solved issues like working in glovebox conditions.

Even if the price of solar panels has come down below labor, the fact that they are produced from rare earth minerals goes (in my opinion) underreported.

Consider the relationship between perovskites and multi-junction solar cells similar to the comparison between sodium and lithium ion batteries. Lithium will always have a higher capacity, but sodium is so abundant that for many applications it just doesn't matter anymore.

Re: Roll-to-roll fabricated perovskite solar cells under ambient room conditions

#54

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 3:14 PM UTC

Workaccount2 wrote: post #33

londons_explore wrote: post #7

The market need for cheaper solar cells seems to have evaporated, since the vast majority of the cost of solar projects these days is always in labour/land/wiring/inverters/grid connection/maintenance contracts. That means saving a bit of money on the panels in return for lower efficiency is never a good deal.

I've been waiting for consumer level panels to get cheaper forever. You'd think by now that you could get a 200W panel for $50. But they have been the same $200 for what seems like a decade now (I suppose they didn't go up with inflation, but still)

[deleted]

Re: Roll-to-roll fabricated perovskite solar cells under ambient room conditions

#55

Post by whitehexagon » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 3:16 PM UTC

Workaccount2 wrote: post #33

londons_explore wrote: post #7

The market need for cheaper solar cells seems to have evaporated, since the vast majority of the cost of solar projects these days is always in labour/land/wiring/inverters/grid connection/maintenance contracts. That means saving a bit of money on the panels in return for lower efficiency is never a good deal.

I've been waiting for consumer level panels to get cheaper forever. You'd think by now that you could get a 200W panel for $50. But they have been the same $200 for what seems like a decade now (I suppose they didn't go up with inflation, but still)

I just put another 5x550W panels up 2 months ago, and they are now 101eur per panel including tax! 30e less than I just paid. wish I had space for more!

Re: Roll-to-roll fabricated perovskite solar cells under ambient room conditions

#56

Post by spywaregorilla » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 3:22 PM UTC

jandrese wrote: post #45

dr_dshiv wrote: post #29

Here is the graph of exponential installed solar capacity [1]. Like Moore’s law, continuous technological innovation and investment will be required to keep the pace. We just hit 1 terawatt— and doubling time seems to be about every 3 years. So… 1,2,4,8,16,32,64,128,512,1028, 2056 terawatts in 30 years? With 20% capacity, that’s equivalent to >300,000 Million Tons of Oil (MToE) per year. Current global energy consump…

Ahh, the classic case of seeing the bottom half of an S curve and projecting it out to infinite exponential growth. The number of times things have experienced infinite exponential growth in all of history starting from the Big Bang: 0.

Ah the classic case of rounding a two digit number to infinity to make a strawman point?

Re: Roll-to-roll fabricated perovskite solar cells under ambient room conditions

#57

Post by riskable » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 3:23 PM UTC

yareal wrote: post #17

As an outsider, what's the appeal of PeSC? The paper says they are less efficient and harder to manufacture, but also that they are the "next generation". I would have thought the next generation would be more efficient or easier to manufacture or both.

The benefit of PeSC is that it can get into efficiencies higher than 20% (higher than traditional industrial cells which typically top out around 18-19%) but the problem with them to date has been the cost of manufacturing. This article is all about solving the "cost of manufacturing" problem.

If we can get the cost of manufacturing PeSC cells down to the same levels of traditional crystalline silicon PV cells then the old style will become obsolete. It's a simple evolution of photovoltaic technology with PeSC cells being the next generation. Not so different from any tech where it's expensive when first introduced but as mass adoption and manufacturing improvements take place the cost comes down.

Re: Roll-to-roll fabricated perovskite solar cells under ambient room conditions

#58

Post by londons_explore » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 3:28 PM UTC

ElevenLathe wrote: post #10

londons_explore wrote: post #7

The market need for cheaper solar cells seems to have evaporated, since the vast majority of the cost of solar projects these days is always in labour/land/wiring/inverters/grid connection/maintenance contracts. That means saving a bit of money on the panels in return for lower efficiency is never a good deal.

If the materials are cheap enough, we might be able to build them into other stuff that was going to use labor anyway (shingles, asphalt, siding, etc). No idea what the economics of this look like though, and electricians (a pretty expensive form of labor) will need to be involved no matter what, but at least theoretically cheaper cells can also deal with labor costs.

I think future designs of panels might be designed in such a way an electrician isn't required. All foolproof plug'n'play connectors and designed in such a way you cannot plug them in in an unsafe way.

You don't call an electrician every time you plug in a hairdryer, and a hairdryer is typically higher voltages and currents than a single panel.

Re: Roll-to-roll fabricated perovskite solar cells under ambient room conditions

#59

Post by mlyle » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 3:34 PM UTC

sandworm101 wrote: post #25

ElevenLathe wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the materials are cheap enough, we might be able to build them into other stuff that was going to use labor anyway (shingles, asphalt, siding, etc). No idea what the economics of this look like though, and electricians (a pretty expensive form of labor) will need to be involved no matter what, but at least theoretically cheaper cells can also deal with labor costs.

>> other stuff that was going to use labor anyway (shingles, asphalt, siding, etc) No. None of that ever works. Everyone has the "good idea" of cramming PV into some other product thinking that doing so will somehow reduce labor. It never does. Solar shingles are typical. They sound great but in reality require hundreds or thousands of electrical connections all spread over the moving flexible surface that is a woode…

Part of why it doesn't work, though, is that PV is too expensive.

If it's cheap enough, you can tolerate failures and poor illumination of the panels for things like fence panels or whatever.

I do agree you need big panels to not have excessive labor from connections.

Re: Roll-to-roll fabricated perovskite solar cells under ambient room conditions

#60

Post by Teever » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 3:38 PM UTC

Osiris wrote: post #43

KeplerBoy wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solar panels are already cheaper than wood, which is amazing.

It’s not cheaper than wood. It’s cheaper than certain specific kinds of wood used in specific applications. A 2x4 stud is like $3, for example. Decorative cedar is quite a bit more expensive.

I don't think that you actually thought that the person you're replying to said that solar panels are now cheaper than all wood always.