German research group Helmholtz Association hopes to accelerate the adoption of flexible printed solar PV technologies by transferring advances in the laboratory to industry through the growing Solar TAP initiative.
The German research group Helmholtz Association has a new platform to transfer flexible printed solar PV technologies from the laboratory to industry.
Known as Solar Technology Acceleration Platform (Solar TAP) for emerging solar photovoltaics, it aims to provide lighter solar PV solutions in a wider range of colors, with a greater range of transparency, not to mention greater tunability of bandgap than what is available in the market today.
According to Jens Hauch, manager of Solar TAP, a roadmap for emerging PV applications is being developed by the Solar TAP participants. Moreover, technology transfer is already underway. “We have initiated several bilateral transfer activities and projects with industry members,” Hauch said pv magazine.
The potential high-growth PV applications that Solar TAP focuses on are multi-benefit or dual-use, including agrivoltaic solar, building-integrated PV (BIPV), mobility and Internet-of-Things (IoT) PV.
Solar TAP is a three-year initiative with €15.1 million ($16.6 million) funding from the Helmholtz Association. Launched in 2023, it is led by three of the eighteen Helmholz research centers, Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH, Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin and Karlsruhe Institute of Technology.
The group has hosted three one-day events since launch with presentations from members of the Solar TAP community from industry and academia. At a meeting in April, the focus was on agrivoltaics, where experts discussed the latest developments in printed solar panel processes, organic PV (OPV) trends from the team that achieved the certified record OPV efficiency of 14.46 percent last year, presented, and news about technology transfer from inkjet printing to make optical filters.
At the time it was noted that there were 90 participants. At the previous industry event in November there were 65. Apparently the Solar TAP network is on a growth path.
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