Environmental and damage assessment of transparent solar cells compared with first and second generations using the LCA approach

Abstract With the development of different generations of solar cell (photovoltaic) technologies, extensive research has been conducted to evaluate their performances, applications, and cost benefits. Despite these technologies being known as green technologies compared with fossil fuels, however, their environmental problems and damages have not been assessed and compared systematically in their whole life cycle. In this study, the environmental effects of different solar cell generations are assessed and compared using the life cycle assessment approach. Environmentally speaking, the results obtained from the software indicate that the first (polycrystalline) and third (transparent Perovskite) generation panels cause the greatest (1.43 × E −6 Daly) and least (4.56 × E −7 Daly) damage to human health, respectively. In addition, these two generations of photovoltaic panels have the most significant and least negative influence on the ecosystem with 2.18 × E −8 and 7.05 × E −10 Species.Yr, respectively. Regarding the environmental effect of damage to the resources, the third and second (cadmium telluride) panels have the least damage with 0.027 USD2013 and 0.0184 USD2013, respectively. The most negative midpoint effect is associated with the marine ecotoxicity of 0.101 kg 1.4‐DCB by the second generation panels. Concerning global warming as the most critical consequence, all three panels also severely impact increasing the global warming index by 399, 164, and 134 (gCO 2 eq), respectively. Based on perovskite technologies that are being rapidly evolved with extensive applications, replacing this technology with the current generations is expected due to its less environmental impacts.