South Korean researchers make breakthrough with organic solar cells

In South Korea, organic solar cells (OSCs) are considered the future of photovoltaics due to their beneficial features like light weight, flexibility, and high conversion efficiency. But, most OSC electrodes use indium tin oxide (ITO), which is too costly and fragile to enable large-area, flexible OSCs. Now, researchers from the Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology have developed non-ITO based OSC electrodes using zinc oxide as a replacement that can help realize low-cost, large-area, efficient OSCs for commercial applications.

Organic solar cells (OSCs), which make use of organic materials to convert sunlight into electricity, are an attractive candidate for future photovoltaics. This is due to several of their desirable features, such as their light weight, flexibility, malleability, and, most importantly, high power conversion efficiency (PCE). Such qualities make them ideal for a wide range of applications.

Despite their massive commercialization potential, however, there is a catch. Most OSCs are produced using a technique called “spin coating”, which allows for high PCEs but makes for poor scalability. Additionally, OSCs with flexible electrodes use indium tin oxide (ITO), which makes them expensive and too fragile for realizing large-area modules. Thus, if the commercial promise of OSCs is to be realized, they must overcome their dependence on ITO.