Project description
Self-healing solar cells for a sustainable future
Climatic challenges demand a timely shift to carbon-free energy. However, relying solely on current solar technologies risks creating an e-waste crisis due to limited reparability and recyclability. With this in mind, the ERC-funded PhoenixPV project focuses on metal halide perovskite (HaP) solar cells, which match commercial performance but suffer from instability and hazardous by-products. The project turns these drawbacks into advantages by designing self-healing cells that can reverse damage and safely capture toxins. Using high-throughput ageing tests and real-time monitoring, it aims to slow degradation and restore solar cell performance. This approach has the goal of extending HaP solar cells’ lifespan and pave the way for repairable photovoltaic systems.
Objective
PhoenixPV aims to develop a sustainable, reparable photovoltaic system using metal halide perovskites (HaP). Climatic challenges require an urgent abrupt growth of carbon-free energy sources, which will unlikely be sustainable if it is solely based on present photovoltaic systems. Their limited reparability and recyclability threaten a mid-term e-waste problem that will damage the environment and menace their social implementation, restraining overall sustainability. While HaP solar cells have demonstrated performance matching the best commercial counterparts, their stability is compromised due to their ionic and chemically dynamic nature, which also leads to potentially hazardous by-products.
Our approach will use these drawbacks in our favor. The chemically dynamic nature, rooted in a low formation energy and ionic properties, can be used as leverage to design intrinsic self-healing strategies and extrinsic post-synthetic treatments, reversing degradation defects and restoring initial performance. Concurrently, these properties will be used to capture the toxic by-products in case of operational accidents and design material separation methods for efficient and safe end-of-life recycling.
PhoenixPV will elucidate the reversible and irreversible reactions using a high-throughput aging characterization system that enables the parallel evaluation of a large number of devices under independently controlled degradation stressors. Beyond conventional efficiency, the system will integrate in-operando characterization techniques such as impedance spectroscopy, to monitor device health and design the necessary healing actions.
While current research aims to slow degradation routes, PhoenixPV seeks to reverse them, extending the effective lifetime of HaP solar cells, reducing associated waste, and establishing a sustainable photovoltaic system. This project holds the key to accelerating HaP commercialization through the design of innovative photovoltaic usage schemes.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- engineering and technology environmental engineering waste management waste treatment processes recycling
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Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2024-COG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
28006 Madrid
Spain
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.