On the way to mass production: perovskite silicon tandem cells
The cluster facility operated at HZB allows to produce large-area perovskite/silicon tandem solar cells. This facility, the only one of its kind in the world, helps to develop new industry-related processes, materials and solar cells. © B. Stannowski / HZB
In order to transfer tandem solar cells from laboratory scale to production, HZB is cooperating with the solar module manufacturer Meyer Burger, which has great expertise in heterojunction technology (HJT) for silicon modules. Within the framework of this cooperation, mass production-ready silicon bottom cells based on heterojunction technology are to be combined with a top cell based on perovskite technology.
Meyer Burger is a manufacturer of high-quality solar modules based on silicon heterojunction technology (HJT). Meyer Burger's research and development team has already developed HJT cells in recent years together with Bernd Stannowski's team at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin.
The HZB has great expertise in the field of perovskite solar cells. Recently, laboratory tandem solar cells combining heterojunction and perovskite have achieved record efficiencies of over 31 percent, largely due to the work of Steve Albrecht's group. However, such record-breaking tandem cells have only the laboratory-standard areas of 1 cm² and are partly produced with processes that are not scalable.
"We are therefore delighted to be cooperating with Meyer Burger to transfer this fantastic technology into application," says Bernd Stannowski, who heads the cooperation at HZB. A new cluster facility (KOALA) will also be used. This globally unique facility, funded by the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Climate Protection (BMWK) and the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), makes it possible to produce perovskite/silicon tandem solar cells in a vacuum on industry-standard large wafers.
"Meyer Burger manufactures in Europe and thus creates high-quality jobs. In doing so, the company is exploiting technologies that were developed in Europe," says Rutger Schlatmann, director of the Photovoltaics Competence Centre Berlin (PVcomB) at HZB. The new cooperation agreement is set to run for three years.
- BESSY II: How intrinsic oxygen shortens the lifespan of solid-state batteriesAlthough solid-state batteries (SSBs) demonstrate high performance and are intrinsically safe, their capacity currently declines rapidly. A team from the TU Wien, Humboldt-University Berlin and HZB has now analysed a TiS₂|Li₃YCl₆ solid-state half-cell in operando at BESSY II using a special sample environment that allows for non-destructive investigation under real operating conditions. Data obtained by combination of soft and hard X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS and HAXPES) revealed a new degradation mechanism that had not previously been identified in solid-state batteries. They have gained some surprising insights, particularly regarding the harmful role played by intrinsic oxygen. This study provides valuable information for improving design and handling of such batteries.
- 83 pupils at Girls'Day at HZBOn 23 April 2026, the annual Girl’s Day took place, giving pupils an insight into various career paths in the fields of science and technology. 83 pupils visited the Adlershof and Wannsee sites and enjoyed a day full of exciting experiments.
- Electrocatalysts: New model for charge separation at the solid-liquid interfaceHydrogen is at the heart of the transition to carbon neutrality, as both an energy carrier and a reagent for green chemistry. However, large-scale production of hydrogen via electrolysis, as well as the production of many other chemical products, requires significantly cheaper and more efficient catalysts. A precise understanding of the electrochemical processes that take place at the interface between the solid catalyst and the liquid medium is highly useful for developing better electrocatalysts. In the journal Nature Communications, an European team has now presented a powerful model that determines charge separation at the interface, the formation of the electric double layer and local electric potential variations, and the resulting influence on the catalytic activity.