Using Plastic in Solar Cells

Plastics are made of long molecules called polymers. They are cheap and lightweight and readily available. Conducting polymers can be used in solar cells to make and conduct electricity. We can make conducting polymers that can also be made into inks so that you could print a solar cell similar to the way you would print a newspaper.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Plastic solar cells
• printable solar cells
• excitonic solar cells
• DSSCs
• dye-sensitised solar cells
• dye sensitized solar cells
• printable polymers
• polymer solar cells

[TheSolarSpark]

These types of solar cells are just about to enter the market very soon. Konarka is soon going to announce some products for end-customers. There is also a company recently launched in the UK, called Eight19.

There are a lot of different polymers used to make solar cells, the one shown in the video is called Poly(3-hexylthiophene-2,5-diyl­) (P3HT), has a rather complicated structure. You can buy these from a range of chemical companies, including Merck, Sigma-Aldrich and Fisher Scientific.

[overunitydotcom]

Hi Bruno,

where can I buy today these plastic solar cells ?

How expensive are they ?

Can you please state, what chemical formula this conductive plastic has and where I can buy it ?

Many thanks.

Regards, Stefan.