Comparative analysis of the outdoor performance of a dye solar cell mini-panel for building integrated photovoltaics applications

New generation photovoltaic (PV) devices such as polymer and dye sensitized solar cells (DSC) have now reached a more mature stage of development, and among their various applications, building integrated PVs seems to have the most promising future, especially for DSC devices. This new generation technology has attracted an increasing interest because of its low cost due to the use of cheap printable materials and simple manufacturing techniques, easy production, and relatively high efficiency. As for the more consolidated PV technologies, DSCs need to be tested in real operating conditions and their performance compared with other PV technologies to put into evidence the real potential. This work presents the results of a 3 months outdoor monitoring activity performed on a DSC mini-panel made by the Dyepower Consortium, positioned on a south oriented vertical plane together with a double junction amorphous silicon (a-Si) device and a multi-crystalline silicon (m-Si) device at the ESTER station of the University of Rome Tor Vergata. Good performance of the DSC mini-panel has been observed for this particular configuration, where the DSC energy production compares favorably with that of a-Si and m-Si especially at high solar angles of incidence confirming the suitability of this technology for the integration into building facades. This assumption is confirmed by the energy produced per nominal watt-peak for the duration of the measurement campaign by the DSC that is 12% higher than that by a-Si and only 3% lower than that by m-Si for these operating conditions. Copyright (C) 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.