Photogalvanic cells: only solar cells having dual role of solar power generation and storage

Solar cell converts solar energy into electricity directly. Among such solar cells, the photogalvanic cells are unique as these are only solar cells that are capable of doing solar power generation and storage simultaneously. Therefore, such an inherent solar power storage capacity that too with good efficiency of these cells needs to be exploited for making solar cell technology a reliable source of power in the future. The fabrication and experimentation of photogalvanic cells is very simple to demonstrate its unique property. The power, short‐circuit current, open‐circuit potential, conversion efficiency, and power storage (in terms of half change time) for photogalvanic cells are reported of the order of 1159 μW, 4500 μA, 1.07 V, 14, and 260 min, respectively. However, to make photogalvanic cells realty in life for simultaneous solar power and storage, some challenges have to be tackled. Some of the challenges are photodecay of dye, corrosion of platinum (Pt), evaporation of liquid, breaking vulnerability of SCE/combination electrode, further need to increase the power and efficiency and storage, assembly operation of cells for augmentation of power, cell study in natural sunlight, and so on. WIREs Energy Environ 2018, 7:e274. doi: 10.1002/wene.274 This article is categorized under: Photovoltaics > Science and Materials Energy and Development > Climate and Environment