How to boost the sustainability of solar cells

In this episode of the Physics World Weekly podcast I explore routes to more sustainable solar energy. My guests are four researchers at the UK’s University of Oxford who have co-authored the “Roadmap on established and emerging photovoltaics for sustainable energy conversion”.

They are the chemist Robert Hoye; the physicists Nakita Noel and Pascal Kaienburg; and the materials scientist Sebastian Bonilla. We define what sustainability means in the context of photovoltaics and we look at the challenges and opportunities for making sustainable solar cells using silicon, perovskites, organic semiconductors and other materials.