[Financial News] Solar cells, known as a representative future energy source, can generate electricity using only sunlight. However, they are sensitive to humidity, requiring costly dry rooms in humid conditions like summer. A new technology has been developed that allows the production of high-efficiency solar cells without needing dry rooms, regardless of humidity.
The research team led by Dr. Hea-Jung Son from the Next-Generation Solar Cell Research Center at the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) announced on the 10th that they have developed a solution process technology that can consistently produce high-efficiency solar cells regardless of the season or humidity. This research is expected to overcome the environmental sensitivity of the solution process, which is regarded as a key technology for the mass production of solar cells.
The research team developed a special additive that controls the flow to ensure the solar cell material solution spreads evenly. This additive addresses the imbalance caused by humidity changes, helping to form a uniform thin film. For solar cells, uniform thin films are crucial for performance, but traditional technologies have led to significant performance variations due to varying humidity levels, such as high humidity in summer or low humidity in winter.
To address this, the team studied the impact of humidity changes on the formation of the photoactive layer thin film during the solar cell solution process. They found that increased humidity changes the surface energy of the substrate, altering the solution flow and consequently deforming the nano-structure of the thin film. In particular, in high humidity environments, non-uniform thin films lead to decreased solar cell performance.
When the additive developed by the team was applied, stability was achieved within ±2% under both high humidity (50-70% relative humidity) in summer and low humidity (10-20%) in winter, which is lower than the variance of typical solar cells. The power generation efficiency also increased from the existing 15.1% to 16.3%. This demonstrates the ability to maintain stable performance regardless of weather or season and shows world-class efficiency on the same area, producing more electricity with smaller sizes.
This technology allows for the stable production of large-area solar cells without expensive dry rooms, contributing to reduced manufacturing costs and improved production efficiency. While setting up a dry room costs tens of millions of won, the additive can be easily applied to existing facilities by mixing it into the solution, enhancing economic feasibility. Amid intense technological competition among major countries like China in the rapidly growing next-generation high-efficiency solar cell market valued at about 2000 trillion won, this technology, which addresses both cost and quality, is evaluated as a core technology to strengthen domestic competitiveness.
The research findings were published in the international journal “Joule” (Impact Factor 38.6, ranked in the top 0.8% in the JCR field).