Perovskite Photovoltaic Modules: Life Cycle Assessment of Pre-industrial Production Process

Photovoltaic devices based on perovskite materials have a great potential to become an exceptional source of energy while preserving the environment. However, to enter the global market, they require further development to achieve the necessary performance requirements. The environmental performance of a pre-industrial process of production of a large-area carbon stack perovskite module is analyzed in this work through life cycle assessment (LCA). From the pre-industrial process an ideal process is simulated to establish a benchmark for pre-industrial and laboratory-scale processes. Perovskite is shown to be the most harmful layer of the carbon stack module because of the energy consumed in the preparation and annealing of the precursor solution, and not because of its Pb content. This work stresses the necessity of decreasing energy consumption during module preparation as the most effective way to reduce environmental impacts of perovskite solar cells.