Opportunities and Challenges for Perovskite Solar Cells Based on Vacuum Thermal Evaporation

Developing an effective scalable fabrication process for perovskite solar cells is urgent to getting perovskite photovoltaic technology market-ready. Perhaps due to the relatively cost-effective setup and tunable fabrication processes, the vast majority of research efforts have been dedicated to the development of solution-based scalable processes. Comparatively, the vacuum thermal evaporation processes have not been studied in-depth, regardless of their advantages in reproducibility, scalability, extendable applications, safety, and toxicity. Here possible opportunities and challenges are discussed in utilizing the vacuum thermal evaporation technique for mass production of large-area perovskite solar modules. While this process has technical and economical potential, more research should be warranted.