Researchers around the world are competing to design and scale next generation solar panels. While current photovoltaic solar panels are generally cost-effective and efficient, the sector is always looking to advance, and find even better ways of converting sunlight into clean energy. 

Solar photovoltaics are on track to be the world’s biggest source of renewable energy by 2029, overtaking hydropower. While solar deployment has risen sharply in recent years, buoyed by supportive policy measures and falling costs, solar technology will need to continue to become more and more efficient to meet global climate goals. “Maintaining a generation growth rate aligned with the NZE Scenario will require doubling of annual capacity additions by 2030,” reports the International Energy Agency. The enormous scale of these necessary capacity additions will require significant research and development “focused on efficiency and other fundamental improvements.”

In the spirit of this imperative, some startups are looking to make solar panels out of materials that absorb more sunlight than the standard silicon model, while others are trying to reimagine the shape and mechanics of panels to allow them to gather more sunlight as the sun changes position in the sky.

A whole slew of startups in California’s Silicon Valley are working on layering silicon solar panels with materials called perovskites for a more efficient final product. “Stacking these two materials, which absorb different wavelengths of sunlight, allows solar panels to reach higher efficiencies and produce more electricity per panel,” reports the MIT Technology Review. “That means perovskite tandem solar cells could reduce costs and boost the amount of renewable electricity on the grid,” the report added.

“While it’s true that silicon is great, tandems are better,” Tomas Leijtens, a cofounder and the chief technology officer of next-gen solar startup Swift, told MIT. “In the fight to tackle climate change, we need to accelerate, not just say, ‘Oh, this is good enough—we’re done.’ Everything can continue to be improved.”

Tandem models have gotten lots of industry attention due to their promise of thinner, more efficient solar panels, and investing dollars have poured in. Just last month, perovskite startup Tandem PV announced a $50 million series A round of funding. “The main goal of this funding is to show that we can prove both the full product working and also the customer demand, and then we can scale up to this billion-dollar-a-year scale, which is pretty exciting,” Tandem CEO Scott Wharton told Inc.

However, scientists have been playing around with perovskite tandem solar panels for over a decade now, and have no commercial inroads to show for it. Some researchers are concerned that if they don’t deliver quickly, all that interest and investing will dry up in the near term.

Other promising next generation solar models include dish-like flexible panels that can swivel to follow the sun around the sky, like a sunflower, and transparent solar panels that can turn windows into power generation stations. These “invisible” panels are edging ever closer to competing with traditional solar panels, which operate at 21% efficiency on average. Once transparent solar panels reach this level of efficiency and are cost-competitive, skyscrapers could be converted into critical urban sources of power production. 

In one of the most recent solar tech breakthroughs, solar panels are being shaped like orbs rather than panels so that they can capture sunlight from any angle. The Japanese company behind these spheroid solar technologies say that their model, Sphelar, will allow for much better absorption than with flat panels, which only perform at maximum output for short periods of the day when the sun’s position is ideal (and the weather is accommodating). “The rest of the day, all that light is wasted,” states a recent report from Unión Rayo. “And that, considering the energy challenges we have ahead, is a luxury we can no longer afford.”

By Haley Zaremba for Oilprice.com

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