Best Research-Cell Efficiencies

52
Multijunction Cells (2-terminal, monolithic) Thin-Film Technologies Sharp
LM = lattice matched CIGS (concentrator) (IMM, 302x) Soitec
48 Boeing- (4-J, 297x)
MM = metamorphic CIGS Spectrolab SolarJunc
IMM = inverted, metamorphic CdTe (LM, 364x) (LM, 942x) FhG-ISE/ Soitec 46.0%
Three-junction (concentrator) Amorphous Si:H (stabilized) Spectrolab FhG-ISE SpireSemicon
Three-junction (non-concentrator) NREL
44 Two-junction (concentrator)
Emerging PV (MM, 299x) (MM, 454x) (MM, 406x) 44.4%
Dye-sensitized cells Boeing-Spectrolab Boeing-Spectrolab NREL
Two-junction (non-concentrator) Soitec (4-J, 327x)
Perovskite cells (not stabilized) (MM,179x) (MM, 240x) (4-J, 319x)
Four-junction or more (concentrator) Perovskite/Si tandem (monolithic) Boeing-
SolarJunc NREL (6-J)
40 Four-junction or more (non-concentrator) Organic cells (various types) NREL (IMM) NREL Spectrolab (5-J)
NREL (IMM, 325.7x) (LM, 418x) 39.2%
Single-Junction GaAs Organic tandem cells Boeing- Sharp (IMM) 37.9%
Inorganic cells (CZTSSe) Boeing- Spectrolab Sharp (IMM)
Single crystal
36 Concentrator Quantum dot cells Spectrolab
Boeing- NREL
Sharp (IMM) FhG-ISE
NREL (38.1x) 35.5%
(various types) Spectrolab (IMM)
Thin-film crystal NREL/ Spectrolab
Spectrolab Spectrolab NREL (467x) NREL (MM) LG
Crystalline Si Cells Japan Spectrolab
32.8%
32 Alta
Single crystal (concentrator) Varian NREL Energy IES-UPM (1026x) FhG-ISE (117x) NREL
NREL (258x)
Efficiency (%)

Single crystal (non-concentrator) NREL LG 30.5%

(216x) FhG-ISE (232x) Alta Alta SunPower (large-area)
Multicrystalline Varian Radboud Univ. Alta 28.9%
Silicon heterostructures (HIT) Varian LG Oxford PV 28.0%
28 (205x) Panasonic LG
Thin-film crystal NREL SunPower (96x) Amonix (92x) Oxford PV 27.8%
Kaneka Kaneka
Stanford Panasonic ISFH FhG-ISE
27.6%
(140x) Kopin Radboud U. FhG-ISE Alta EPFL Stanford/ASU 26.6%
Varian UNSW UNSW
Panasonic Solexel ZSW SolarFron 26.1%
24 Spire UNSW UNSW
UNSW
Sanyo Sanyo NREL
NREL (14.7x) First Solar
(15.4x) ISCAS ISCAS
23.7%
IBM FhG-ISE Sanyo 23.3%
UNSW UNSW UNSW Sanyo ZSW FhG-ISE KRICT
(T.J. Watson Stanford NREL Sanyo EMPA (Flex poly) NREL
UNSW / 22.9%
UNSW (14x) ZSW KRICT/UNIST 22.3%
Research Center) Georgia Eurosolare FhG-ISE 22.1%
20 ARCO Georgia Georgia Tech
ISFH First Solar 21.2%
Tech Tech NREL Solexel KRICT
Westing- Spire Varian UNSW NREL NREL NREL NREL EPFL Univ. of
house NREL NREL U. Stuttgart FhG-ISE Solibro Trina
NREL SolarFron Queensland
Sandia First Solar GE First 16.6%
16 RCA
No. Carolina
U. So.
Florida Matsushita NREL
Solar GE SCUT-CSU 15.6%
Solarex NREL U. Stuttgart UniSolar Mitsubishi KRICT AIST Raynergy
Mobil State U. Solarex AIST
Boeing Euro-CIS (aSi/ncSi/ncSi) LG EPFL Tek of Taiwan 14.0%
Solar NREL UniSolar UniSolar IBM NREL UCLA
Kodak ARCO ARCO NIMS Sharp IBM HKUST
12 Boeing
Kodak Kodak Boeing Sharp UCLA
ICCAS 12.6%
11.9%
Photon Energy EPFL IBM 11.5%
Kodak AMETEK IBM Phillips 66
Matsushita Boeing UCLA-Sumitomo
Boeing EPFL U.Toronto
Solarex ARCO Konarka
8 U.of Maine
Monosolar UniSolar Solarmer Heliatek MIT U.Toronto
NREL / Konarka Konarka UCLA
Boeing RCA EPFL Sumi- U.Toronto
U.of Maine Groningen U. Linz (PbS-QD)
EPFL tomo

(Rev. 12-18-2018)
4 Siemens
Plextronics Heliatek
RCA U. Linz U. Dresden NREL
RCA RCA RCA U. Linz
(ZnO/PbS-QD)
RCA RCA
0
1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015 2020