A new solar energy storage process based on photosynthesis

The storage of solar energy is a recurring problem, but which today finds more and more solutions.American researchers were inspired by the photosynthesis of plants to succeed in keeping the energy produced by photovoltaic cells for several weeks.An advance that could change the way of designing solar panels.

The materials currently used in most solar panels placed on residential roofs can only store the energy of the sun the moment of a few microseconds.A new technology developed by chemists at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA) is able to store solar energy for several weeks.The results were published on June 19 in the journal Science.

Sarah Tolbert, professor of chemistry at the UCLA is one of the main authors of this research.She explains :

These structures make it possible to remove the electrons from the positively loaded molecules and to maintain the two separated as long as necessary."This separation is the key that makes the process so effective," adds Sarah Tolbert.

A process helping to replace silicon

Today, manufacturers are looking to replace traditional solar panels built from silicon with polymers, in order to lower the costs of raw material.These recent photovoltaic cells composed of organic materials use molecules derived from Fullenene as an electron escapers.Fullenene is a molecule in the shape of a football ball.The most common of them is made up of 60 carbon atoms.

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One of the major drawbacks of these organic structures in relation to silicon is that separate positive and negative electrical charges often recombine before they can become electrical energy: because of the disorder that reigns in thestructure, electrons return too quickly to polymer channels, making the process ineffective.

UCLA chemists propose to reorganize materials within organic photovoltaic cells, as in plants: in green, chains of donor polymers and purple and orange, the Fullenes Acceptors.

In this recomposed nanostructure, the electrons of the polymer channels are expelled to the Fullenene located outside.These are then trapped for several hours or even several weeks and can thus produce electricity when it is desired.

For the time being, the tests have only been carried out in solution, but the next step is to integrate this new technology directly into real solar cells.

It also remains to be seen whether organic solar panels will succeed in replacing silicon cells.Indeed, their main weakness lies in their still limited lifespan induced by the degradation of polymers when they are exposed to the sun.

Source: Futura-Sciences