Question: Do you think its efficient enough to use dyed solar cells on a large scale, compared to traditional solar cells.

Edward Bovill answered on 14 Mar 2013:

The idea of using the new generation of solar cells, such as dye-sensitised or organic-polymer (the ones I work on – here organic means made from molecules that include carbon and polymer means plastic), is that they are considerably cheaper and easier to produce than the current standard silicon solar cells.

Silicon solar cells, especially the most efficient, single crystal variety, are extremely expensive and energy intensive to produce. They are also really heavy and need large supporting structures on your roof to support them.

The benefits of the dye-sensitised or organic-polymer solar cells is that they are considerably cheaper to produce and weigh considerably less. The type of solar cells I work on, the organic-polymer ones, can be sprayed directly onto surfaces to make large area, cheap solar panels. Ten grams of the special plastics I use to make my solar panels could make over a kilometre of solar panels (10cm wide)!

One problem that these new types of solar cells have is that they only last for about 5 years before they stop working. Silicon solar panels last for at least 25 years or longer. This is a big research project at the moment for those of working on these new solar cells and we really need to work out how to get them to last longer. Until this problem has been solved you won’t be seeing any of these new types of solar cells for sale!