Organic solar cells

Today’s world’s demand for energy corresponds to capacity of about 13 TW, at the same time combustion of carbon-containing fuels produces about 80% of the world's energy. Since the combustion rate of such fuels is about 1,000 times higher than the rate of their natural accumulation, the available resources, especially oil and gas reserves, would be depleted in the foreseeable future. On the other hand, the solar power alone has the potential to fully meet the global human energy needs. The most convenient way to utilise solar energy is its conversion into electricity with solar panels (SPs) — solar photovoltaics. The term SP refers to a single solar cell (SC) with the dimensions not exceeding 20 cm, solar modules consisting of electrically connected SCs, as well as solar panels composed of modules. To meet all energy needs of the Russian Federation, it would be enough to cover an area of 100×100 square kilometres (=10 sq. Gm) with solar panels, which are 10% efficient. However, the current solar photovoltaic technologies do not allow this for economic reasons as a watt of solar photovoltaics is too expensive compared to a carbon watt. Nevertheless, the global installed capacity of solar photovoltaics has already exceeded 1 TW and shows annual growth rate of about 25%, with a gradually decreasing cost per solar watt. However, photovoltaics still account for only 5% of global electricity consumption.