The United Kingdom’s Carbon Trust announced the launch of a new solar company that aims to develp and manufacture plastic solar cells.
Eight19 Limited was spun out of the Carbon Trust photovoltaic funding initiative with Cambridge University. Eight19 is now focused on developing product prototypes, backed by a £4.5 million investment from the Carbon Trust and specialty chemicals company Rhodia (RHA.NX).
Eight19, so called as it takes 8 minutes and 19 seconds for light to travel from the sun to the earth, has been created in partnership with Professor Sir Richard Friend, Professor Henning Sirringhaus and Professor Neil Greenham of Cambridge’s renowned Cavendish Laboratory, and technology development company TTP.
With improvements in efficiency and lifetime, breakthroughs in organic photovoltaic technology could provide solar power at a price substantially lower than that offered by 1st and 2nd generation technologies for certain applications, which could open up new markets for solar.
Eight19’s focus on the low cost potential of solar cells made with semiconducting plastics (also known as organic photovoltaics, or OPV) is built on the Cavendish Laboratory’s capability to develop techniques for fabricating large scale plastic electronic devices on flexible materials using roll-to-roll processes. The company will continue to be actively engaged with the Cavendish and its innovative research output.
The market for organic solar cells has the potential to reach $500 million by 2015 and to grow four fold to $2 billion by 2020 (Nanomarkets, 2009) driven by applications such as building-integrated photovoltaics, and could save up to 900 million tons of CO2 by 2050.
Unlike other more familiar thin film solar platforms, organic solar cells are not inherently limited by constraints around material supply and toxicity, and benefit from a number of fundamental advantages including potentially very low cost production enabled by low temperature and high throughput processing typical of plastic films. Organic solar cells potentially deliver further value throughout the supply chain, from ease of installation for construction companies to producers seeking simplified manufacturing integration.
Dr Robert Trezona, Head of R&D at the Carbon Trust said, “The launch of Eight19 and the deployment of low cost organic solar cells could help to revolutionize solar power production by opening up new markets. Cost reduction through the development of advanced technology and innovative design are key to driving forward mass production and making solar power more affordable.”
Pascal Juery, Group Executive Vice-President of Rhodia, said, “This investment is perfectly in line with our strategy to explore new promising market segments fitting with our sustainable development commitment."
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