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Solar Energy pp 79–96Cite as

Mesoscopic Solar Cells

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Introduction

Perhaps, the largest challenge for our global society is to find ways to replace the slowly but inevitably vanishing fossil fuel supplies by renewable resources. The problem is compounded by an increase in the worldwide consumption of energy, which is expected to double within the next 40 years from the current level of 500 exajoules/year (exa = 1018) to 1,000 exajoules/year. This additional demand cannot be met by accelerated combustion of fossil fuels , which would entail enhanced environmental pollution and global warming, leave alone the fact that oil production has already peaked and will decline in the future (Fig. 1). Furthermore, the current ongoing disaster at the Fukushima reactor site in Japan along with previous major accidents has exposed to the world the risks and limitations of nuclear energy use, leave alone that the issue of where to store nuclear waste over ten thousands of years in a safe manner and at what cost remains unresolved to date.

Mesoscopic...

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Abbreviations

AM1.5:

Air mass 1.5: Defines position of the sun where the path through the atmosphere is 1.5 longer than at a vertical incidence.

Fill factor of the cell:

Maximum power output of the cell divided by the product of open circuit photo-voltage (Voc) times the short circuit photocurrent density.

IPCE:

Incident photon to electric current conversion efficiency, presents the ratio of the electric current generated by monochromatic light of a certain wavelength over the incident photon flux.

Mesoscopic:

Size domain between 2 and 50 nm.

Power conversion efficiency (PCE):

the maximal electric power generated by the photovoltaic cell divided by the incident solar light intensity under AM 1.5 standard reporting conditions (Intensity of the sunlight 1000W/m2 and T= 298 K).

Sensitizer:

Dye molecule generating electric charges from sunlight.

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Acknowledgment

I am grateful to my coworkers and for the support by the organizations listed below. Swiss CTI, CCEM-CH, Swiss National Science Foundation, Swiss Energy Office, US Air Force (European Office of Aerospace Research and Development), FP7 European Joule Program. European Research Council (Advanced Research Grant) GRL Korea (with KRICT) KAUST Center for Advanced Molecular Photovoltaics (CAMP) at Stanford University, Industrial Partners.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Photonics and Interfaces, Institute of Chemical Science and Engineering, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland

    Dr. Michael Grätzel (Faculty of Basic Science)

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  1. Dr. Michael Grätzel
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Correspondence to Michael Grätzel .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Plataforma Solar de Almeria Institute of Solar Research DLR – German Aerospace Centre, Cologne, Germany

    Christoph Richter

  2. Institute of Research and Development of Photovoltaic Energy, Chatou Cedex, France

    Daniel Lincot

  3. Solar Consulting Services, Colebrook, NH, USA

    Christian A. Gueymard

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Grätzel, M. (2013). Mesoscopic Solar Cells . In: Richter, C., Lincot, D., Gueymard, C.A. (eds) Solar Energy. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-5806-7_465

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