The search for sustainable energy sources has led to the development of innovative technologies, such as semi-transparent organic solar cells, which offer many possibilities, including the use on the roofs of ecological greenhouses.
However, their adoption has been held back by the lack of knowledge of the technology and by doubts about its impact on crops. Today, perhaps, the perception of the masses could begin to change. Researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) have shown that using these semi-transparent solar cells on a miniature greenhouse leads to surprisingly better plant growth than in a conventional greenhouse.
Semi-transparent, efficient. And stable.
There is more from the study just carried out and published in Nature (I link it here). One way to remedy the "congenital" defect of organic solar cells is their poor stability. The team added a layer of a chemical called L-glutathione, which occurs naturally in antioxidant dietary supplements, and found that this solution prevented the degradation of the semi-transparent organic solar cells. Not only that, the L-glutathione layer blocked ultraviolet and infrared rays, which can harm plants and cause greenhouses to overheat. This, for all intents and purposes, is the turning point of the research.
"We didn't expect organic solar cells to outperform conventional greenhouses, but we repeated the experiments several times with the same results," he says. Yepin Zhao, lead author of the study. Also, after further research and analysis, the researchers found that plants don't need as much sunlight as originally thought. In fact, too much sun exposure can do more harm than good, especially in climates like California, where sunlight is more abundant. So, thanks to organic solar cells, plants can grow better and healthier than excess sunlight. A startling discovery that could change the way plants are grown in the future.
More details on the results
The test results showed that the semi-transparent organic solar cells with the protective layer of L-glutathione maintained more than 80% efficiency after 1.000 hours of continuous use. Without this layer they are gone less than 20%. Important figures, which authorize enthusiasm: the same researchers have created a startup at UCLA, which wants to bring these semi-transparent organic solar cells to an industrial scale.
In other words: ecological and solar greenhouses are about to make headway. New blood for agri-voltaics, gentlemen. Does anyone still doubt it?
