PROJECT DESCRIPTION
BACKGROUND
Buildings are responsible for 40% of energy consumption and 36% of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in Europe. It is estimated that 75% of buildings are energy inefficient, a problem likely to persist given their lifespan. Decreasing building carbon footprint is thus important to achieve the energy and climate ambitions of the European Commission. Building automation is a powerful tool to achieve this, and sensors for temperature, CO2, humidity, etc., are key parts of energy optimisation. Light energy harvesting will accelerate progress, by powering sensors in smart building systems. As all new buildings are required to be CO2 neutral by 2030, there is a need for flexible solar cells, adaptable to any available surface, and building integrated photovoltaics is seen as a major opportunity for the large-scale market introduction of alternative photovoltaic (PV) technologies. This is, however, challenging as this requires 1TW of renewables to be installed every year by 2030 (an acceleration of the current production by a factor of 35!). Hence, any technology aiming for planetary impact needs to be very scalable. Another important factor is the need for a very short energy payback time (EPBT), unlike current silicon-based technologies. A third requirement is the use of critical resources, which are often toxic and/or in limited supply; therefore, any technology aiming for planetary impact needs to consist of non-toxic and available material. The Internet of Things (IoT) revolution has created an explosion in affordable, networked devices, which are needed for the digital transformation to measure and optimise performance. However, this rapid growth in demand for IoT sensors poses several challenges, among which generating and storing energy for the wireless sensors is the most pressing. Powering sensors is a challenge due to hard-to-reach locations and high maintenance requirements. Energy for small wireless devices is currently provided primarily by batteries, but even long-life batteries need replacing, and each replacement costs more than the batteries themselves. This limits ubiquitous sensor deployment, particularly indoors. With 200 000 tons of batteries sold each year in the EU alone, and with less than 50% recycling, battery technology represents a major waste problem.
OBJECTIVES
The LIFE SUNRISE project will scale up and demonstrate Epishine’s paradigm-shifting organic photovoltaic (OPV) solar cell production technology. The aim is to widen consumer access to innovative OPV solutions in the IoT context (and in the long term also building integrated photovoltaics), offering affordable organic solar cells in huge volumes, thereby accelerating the global shift to sustainable energy solutions.
These objectives will be reached through the:
- Verification of the innovative concept at pilot scale (5% of full scale) in real-world operating conditions.
- Development and verification of a standard design concept that can be used for construction of full-scale facilities.
- Testing and quality control of the OPV solar cells when used in relevant IoT applications.
- Dissemination of the project outcomes to potential stakeholders and target groups in Europe.
- Performance of a fast replication and commercialisation, based upon the results of the demonstration.
RESULTS
Expected results:
- Increase of organic photovoltaic (OPV) production capacity to 20 000 000 OPV modules per year by developing new machines, continuous improvement, enhanced logistics and data management.
- Reduction of production costs by 85% by removing manual steps, decreasing downtime and capacity, and reducing material cost by negotiating volume prices.
- Reduction of approx. 13 000 tons of CO2 emissions and 500 tons of battery waste by replacing primary batteries with the light energy harvesting concept.
- Reduction of use of critical raw materials by 50 tons per year due to replacement of primary batteries.
- Reaching renewable energy production by light energy harvesting capacity of 3 000 kWh per year by the end of the project.
