Commercial solar energy is experiencing a Boom as technology improves and prices continue to drop year after year. [LINK]
But, even today in 2022, a lot of homeowners are still on the fence. Aging home infrastructure and high upfront costs are major deterrents for going solar. [LINK]
So, what if we could produce solar panels that were 3x lighter and 3x cheaper than today’s traditional solar panels? And what if we could make them by using plain old industrial printers?
While this technology may sound too good to be true, it’s actually in development right now thanks to Professor Paul Dastoor and a team of researchers at the University of Newcastle in Australia.
After over 15 years in the lab, Dastoor and his team recently partnered with CHEP, an Australian shipping supply company, as part of a pilot program to test their ink-printed solar panels in the real world.
By the way — if you’re into real world energy solutions, hit that like button!
The key innovation is a semi-conducting liquid ink that can go inside a standard ink-jet printer.
The liquid is then literally printed onto sheets of polyethylene, one layer after another, until the cells are about 200 microns thick — three times the thickness of a single strand of hair! The cells then get a layer of aluminum before they’re laminated to protect them from damage. The final product actually looks kind of like a potato chip package!
It’s possible that down the road, the liquid itself could be applied to all kinds of surfaces like roof tiles, side panels, glass, and even steel. Eventually, these printed solar panels could be embedded into buildings or windows! But — that’s putting the cart a bit before the horse!!
This process makes these panels incredibly easy to produce. With the university’s smaller-scale printers, which were originally used to make wine labels — they’re able to output hundreds of meters per day. Upgrading to a commercial scale printer could increase output from meters to kilometers!
One benefit of this insane production speed is that the cells can be made in large quantities on demand. This could have far reaching implications in terms of disaster response and preparedness. Imagine during a natural disaster being able to supply hundreds of meters of solar cells in a matter of hours.
The panels are also extremely lightweight — about 300 times lighter than traditional cells. A typical solar panel can weigh up to 42 pounds — and that’s not even including installation hardware! This could make them an incredibly attractive feature for older homes whose roofs might not be able to support the weight of traditional installations. It’s one thing to have to consider the upfront cost of a solar installation, but if you have to reroof your home first — forget it!
These printed panels are so light they can stick to just about any roof using double-sided tape! For the pilot program, a system totaling 640m of material was installed by a team of 5 in just one day!
And as an added bonus — being made of over 99% PET materials, the panels are almost entirely recyclable — a distinct advantage over traditional silicon panels!
But the real question is, how do these panels perform compared to typical solar panels?
The first thing to look at, of course, is energy efficiency — of the sun’s energy that hits these panels, how much is actually converted into electricity?
Today, the most commonly used solar panels are monocrystalline silicon panels. The hard truth is that even the most efficient panels operate at around 22% efficiency — meaning that even sitting all day in direct sunlight, less than a quarter of that light gets converted into usable energy.
And that’s sort of a best case scenario. Most panels actually run somewhere between 15 and 20% efficiency. Now — that’s not meant to knock solar panels. Obviously we’re all about that solar life! But — as we’ve covered on this channel in many other videos — one of the big challenges engineers face when it comes to solar is increasing that efficiency. t
So, how do these printed panels stack up in terms of efficiency? Well… based on figures from the pilot program… not great… in fact… pretty dismal… maxing out at around 3% efficiency!
What would that mean in terms of energy output? Let’s look at a typical panel with a surface area of 2 meters squared — and yes, size, in this case, DOES matter, but we’ll explain why in a bit.
So let’s say this panel, running at between 15 and 20% efficiency, puts out about 330 watts. If that panel gets 8 hours of sunlight a day, it will produce around 2.8 kWhs per day.
A printed panel of the same size, running at around 3% efficiency and getting the same exposure to sunlight, would produce only about 20-30 watts, which amounts to between .16 and .24 kWh per day!
That means to generate the same amount of power, you’d need 10 to 15 times the amount of surface area!
But… it doesn’t stop there. In terms of longevity, traditional panels can last well over 30 years.
Right now, these printed panels are only expected to last about 1-2 years! Again… not even close!
So — case closed, right? These panels are a dud! If they don’t last as long and they don’t produce anywhere close to the same amount of energy — why even bother?!
Well, my friends, now it’s time to think like an engineer!
So while, no, printed solar panels can’t even come close to competing with traditional panels in terms of efficiency — that’s not the whole story.
But before we dive into that, we want to share with you this week’s sponsor!
Let’s look back at that 330 watt panel from before.
Right now, The Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) estimates the national average cost of a residential solar panel system between $2.66 and $2.94 per watt. But, here in San Diego, where I live, it’s $3 per watt.
The average San Diego homeowner needs a 2.8-kilowatt system — about 8 of those 330 watt panels — which would cost at least $8400 ( before tax credits).
So a single 2 square meter panel producing 330 at $3 per watt would cost about $990, or $495 per meter squared. Typically, you don’t measure panel cost or efficiency in terms of surface area, but since that’s how the printed panels are made, it’s a more applicable metric. So these numbers are really just approximations, but just stick with us!
Now let’s look at the printed panels.
Right now, the developers are able to produce panels at less than $10 per square meter! That means to produce a 2 meter squared, 10-15-watt panel would cost roughly $20 — which comes out to only $.75 per watt!
Even compared to Tesla Solar Roof shingles, which cost roughly $1.80 per watt, that’s a savings of over 50% per watt!
But, Ricky, didn’t you say that you need 10 to 15 times the amount of surface area to get the same amount of energy?
Yes! So what would that look like? Remember, we said to generate the 2.8 kW needed by the average San Diego homeowner, we’d need 8 traditional panels measuring about 2 meters squared each, taking up a total surface area of 16 meters squared.
The pilot system used about 640 total meters of printed solar panels connected to form a 200-square-meter bank. And the total cost of the project? About $2,000!
This is where this technology could truly be competitive. At scale, the price per watt is still significantly cheaper.
Now, of course, there is still one glaring problem. Could most residential roofs even support 200 square meters of solar panels? And that’s up for debate. Here in San Diego, the average home size is about 2400 square feet, or about 240 square meters.
Now, the size of a roof will vary from house to house, but generally speaking — the roof surface area is greater than your floor surface area — so a 240 meter squared floor plan will have at least 240 square meters of roof surface, if not more! And smaller homes would likely require less power. So its possible that your roof would have more than enough surface area! Roofers, feel free to drop your expertise in the comments below!
So, while printed solar panels, in their current form, are significantly less efficient than traditional panels — they are exponentially cheaper. And since they are so lightweight, and easy to apply, requiring no racks or mounts, you could theoretically outfit your entire roof with panels for about ¼ the price of a typical solar installation.
And even if they may not be the perfect fit for every home, they could certainly benefit businesses whose buildings may have larger roof areas!
There is still one more application researchers are exploring with this technology, and that’s using them to power Electric Vehicles! By September of 2022, the team plans to outfit a Tesla with 18 flexible panels of organic solar cells to see how both the vehicle and the panels endure while driving around the Australian coastline. If you follow this channel, you may remember a while back we actually covered Solar EVs! So if you haven’t seen that yet, you should definitely watch after this video!
Still, Dastoor and his team recognize the need to produce more efficient panels before hitting the market. But though development is still ongoing, this step in commercial application is major. The team currently estimates that Australia could see these printed panels hitting the market within two years!
Over the last decade or so, we’ve seen solar not only get significantly more efficient, but exponentially cheaper! And with this product already proven in the lab, and making its way into commercial spaces, it’s already proving to be a viable contender in the solar market.
The team is already exploring ways to make the technology more efficient — including experimenting with Perovskite materials — an alternative to silicon that has the potential to significantly increase solar efficiency! We’ve actually done a deep dive into perovskite solar in a previous video which you can check out here!