Pioneering newresearch could pave the way for solar energy to be converted into householdelectricity more cheaply than ever before.

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A team of experts from the University of Exeter has examined newtechniques for generating photovoltaic (PV) energy -- or ways in which toconvert light into power -- more cost efficiently.

The global PV market has experienced rapid growth in recent years due torenewable energy targets and CO2 emission controls.

However, current, widely-used commercial methods employed to generate PVenergy, such as using silicon or thin film based technologies, are stillexpensive as they are processed through vacuum-based techniques. Thedevelopment of technologies and the invention of new materials could lead tothe reduction of PV energy generation costs.

Now, the team of scientists from Exeter has found that one such material,a mineral called perovskite, could hold the key to cheaper PV energygeneration.

Crucially, the team conducted studies with perovskite in Alta Floresta(Brazil), Frenchman Flat, (USA) , Granada (Spain), Beijing (China), Edinburgh(UK) and Solar Village (Saudi Arabia), and confirmed its efficiency inconverting light to power in a range of atmospheric conditions, rather thanjust under direct sunlight.

The research by the team from the Environment and Sustainability Institute(ESI), based at the University of Exeter''''s Penryn Campus in Cornwall, ispublished in the journal Solar Energy Materials & Solar Cells.

Professor Tapas Mallick, who was involved in the research said: "Thisresearch offers the potential for significant progress to be made in findingcheaper ways to generate PV energy. The results, which show how perovskitedevices work under real operating conditions, will lead to our understandingthem better, which will benefit industrial-scale production processes.

"Given concern on large-scale solar farms across the country, suchtechniques will be key to understand how the Perovskite technology integrateswithin our building envelope."

Dr Senthilarasu Sundaram, also from the ESI, added: "The research isquestioning the perovskite material''''s ability to produce stable solar cellsunder versatile climatic conditions. The obtained results are very crucial interms of perovskite solar cell growth and understanding how to make betterdevices."