© HZB/Baip
Inolope Expo 2025
© HZB/Baip
© HZB/Baip
© HZB/Baip
We look back on 3 exciting days at the Inolope Expo 2025.
From February 12 to 14, 2025, the first Inolope Expo took place in Dortmund, a trade fair covering all aspects of innovative building envelopes. In addition to trade associations from the façade technology and green building sectors, various suppliers offered technical solutions for the façade design of today and tomorrow. An interesting program of specialist lectures, product presentations and panel discussions was offered on all three days at the dedicated trade fair forum.
The trade fair took place parallel to the established elektrotechnik, the trade fair for building, energy and industrial technology. The combination of the two trade fairs meant that there were many specialists who were particularly interested in the field of photovoltaics, as well as visitors who were explicitly interested in the building envelope, both in terms of design and function.
We from BAIP were represented with our own stand, which gave visitors a clear and practical insight into the possibilities of building-integrated photovoltaics. In particular, our 1:1 scale demonstrators of a solar façade and a roof section with solar roof tiles drew the attention of many interested visitors to us and our topics.
In over 360 stimulating conversations with the knowledgeable visitors, we were able to discuss the opportunities and challenges of building-integrated photovoltaics in depth, refute some prejudices and, above all, provide advice and information.
In close cooperation with the organizers of the trade fair and under the excellent moderation of Fabian Flade from the BIPV Alliance, we were able to provide various insights into topics such as building law and simulation of BIPV projects at the Inolope expert forum and present current results and experiences from our BIPV living laboratory / HZB. Together with Gunter Mann from the Bundesverband GebäudeGrün and Markus Schultz from the Verband für Fassadentechnik, we discussed “New Approaches” for the building envelope on a panel.
All in all, the first Inolope Expo was a great success for us at the BAIP. We were able to reach many interested people and also take away a few suggestions. We will certainly be continuing some of the discussions in the coming weeks.
- Does African Architecture exist?The world’s first Pan-African Architecture Biennale took place this September in Nairobi, Kenya. People from the worlds of architecture, art, academia and politics from 54 African countries and the diaspora had travelled to Nairobi to exchange ideas on traditional and contemporary building methods, materials, experiences and projects. Samira Aden co-organised this biennial as lead curator. We spoke to her about it.
- BESSY II: Evaporated perovskites in tandem solar cells improvedPerovskite-silicon tandem solar cells achieve significantly higher efficiencies than silicon solar cells on their own. One particularly attractive method is co-evaporation of the perovskite precursor molecules on top of the silicon subcell. Scientists at HZB have analysed film growth on the nanoscale at BESSY II and found a new way to improve the quality of the perovskite layer: adding a thin seed layer of caesium chloride between the two sub-cells promotes uniform perovskite growth and suppresses the formation of undesired lead iodide at the interface.
- New contact material boosts the efficiency of perovskite solar cellsA newly developed material for the electron contact improves the efficiency of single perovskite solar cells and perovskite/silicon tandem solar cells. The new material is based on a carborane molecule. It offers several advantages over the standard material C60, as shown by the study led by Steve Albrecht’s team. The new material has since been patented and is already commercially available.