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Boston Globe

Woburn startup could give US solar industry a second chance

Advertisement 'If you have something that has competitive performance at low cost then you can actually beat the Chinese silicon cells,' said chief executive Shiv Bhakta. 'No one's been able to do that before.' Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Bhakta holds a masters in civil engineering from MIT and an MBA from MIT Sloan School of Management. He teamed up with Richard Swartwout, with an MIT doctorate in electrical engineering and MIT research scientist Jeremiah Mwaura to develop the new technology and a process to manufacture the solar power cells in large volumes. Active Surfaces has attracted $5.6 million in a funding round led by Cambridge-based Bhakta thinks his company's technology can hasten the drive toward 'net zero' global carbon emissions by supplanting coal-, gas- and oil-fired power plants. He estimates that getting the Earth to net zero will require adding two gigawatts of carbon-free electrical generating capacity per day, every day, for the next 20 years. That's enough power to supply about 1.6 million households, or the equivalent of firing up two nuclear power plants, every day. And that's not going to happen. Advertisement But Bhakta says the goal could be met if millions of homes and businesses worldwide were coated with cheap, lightweight, easily installed solar collectors. Ultra-thin solar power collectors have been under development since the 1970s, but researchers have struggled to develop versions that could match the price and performance of silicon panels. 'They would either cost too much or they wouldn't perform at the same level,' said Bhakta. For instance, thin panels made for electric utilities by US company First Solar, can convert only about 20 percent of sunlight into electric power, compared to about 28 percent for the most advanced silicon panels. Active Surfaces aims to meet these challenges by using a blend of lead iodide and organic compounds, formed into a complex crystal structure called perovskitewhich can be made into solar cells far thinner than a human hair. These cells can be printed onto plastic sheets to produce a solar power collector as flexible as a shower curtain. 'A piece of plastic can go in and then a functioning solar module can go out,' said Bhakta. Except for the specialized print head that places the perovskite compound onto the plastic, the rest of the manufacturing system uses equipment similar to that used in making photographic film or printing plastic labels. All the necessary equipment and supplies can be readily obtained from multiple sources, short-circuiting China's domination of the supply chain for silicon-based solar cells. Unlike earlier thin-film technologies, Active Surfaces' perovskite power cells produce almost as much electricity as silicon cells of the same surface area. And installing them will be far simpler and cheaper than bolting down some heavy silicon panels. Instead, said Bhakta, 'you can get a yoga mat-style form factor that could be unrolled onto buildings.' Advertisement The Active Surfaces system could be attached to nearly any object in need of a power boost. The cells might someday be integrated into car bodies to add supplemental power between charges, or they could replace heavier solar cells on spacecraft. But Nitin Padture, professor of materials science at Brown University, warned that the Active Surfaces solar collectors have only a 10-year lifespan, half the life expectancy of silicon cells. 'That is the downside,' said Padture. 'There is no free lunch.' Meantime, silicon cells have plummeted in price, making it even harder for a new and untested technology to crack the market. 'Innovation now lies in how you beat this dichotomy,' Padture said. He thinks Active Surfaces' must show that its solar collectors can be installed much faster and cheaper than traditional solar installations. It might not matter that the cells last half as long, if replacing them is one-fourth the cost of putting in silicon, Padture said. Last year, Active Surfaces received a $30,000 grant from the US Department of Energy; this year it's facing the rise of the Trump Administration, with its aggressive support for fossil fuel development and skepticism about alternative energy. But Bhakta is counting on another Trump imperative: Putting America first. Because Active Surfaces can help make the US more self-sufficient in solar power, 'there's a very big energy security benefit,' Bhakta said. 'I think this administration is very passionate about onshoring.' Advertisement And if the new administration turns a cold shoulder, Bhakta is open to seeking out support from abroad. 'There's continuing international interest.' he said, 'regardless of how the US swings.' Hiawatha Bray can be reached at