IPVF in brief

Become an actor of the Energy Transition by joining a team driven by innovation and impact to address today’s most decisive challenges.

IPVF – Institut Photovoltaïque d’Île-de-France, is a global Research, Innovation and Education center, which mission is to accelerate energy transition through science & technology.

Gathering industrial PV leaders (EDF, Total, Air Liquide, Horiba and Riber) and world-renowned academic research teams (CNRS, Ecole Polytechnique), multi-disciplinary and international IPVF teams conduct research for clean energy technologies.

Supported by the French State, IPVF is labelled Institute for Energy Transition (ITE).

IPVF at a glance:

• An ambitious Scientific and Technological Program: from tandem solar cell technologies to economy & market assessment, state-of-the art characterization, photocatalysis and concepts breakthrough.
• A state-of-the-art technological platform: more than 100 tools, located in cleanrooms (advanced characterization, materials deposition, prototypes for fabrication, modelling…).
• A high-standard Education program (M.S. and PhD students).

Job context

Perovskite solar cells are the “rising star” of solar cell development in the world-wide research community of photovoltaics. The efficiency of stand-alone perovskite single-junction solar cells approach already the world record efficiencies of silicon solar cells and by combining perovskite cells with silicon cell to so-called tandem cells, an efficiency above 29% has been achieved by the international research community. However, the practical use for renewable energy production still requires improvements in the long-term stability perovskite cells. In our work group we therefore investigate the aging characteristics of perovskites in order to predict real-world performance under operating conditions and to guide the cell development at IPVF.

IPVF Research Program involving this postdoc position: https://ipvf.fr/jean-paul-kleider-philip-schulz-and-daniel-ory-introducing-programme-4-characterization-modeling-reliability/

Main missions

The candidate will directly report to the Deputy Programs Director of IPVF.

The Postdoctoral Researcher will be in charge of developing the reliability activities of IPVF on perovskite materials and tandem solar cell devices with the following missions:

• Close cooperation with solar cell development team define cell and module structures for degradation tests.

• Adaptation of test protocols for reliability testing that address the challenges of perovskite cells.

• Definition and exploration of new test procedures according to the stages of the cell development.

• Characterization of solar cells and mini-modules before, after and during degradation procedures.

• Determining correlations between fabrication process technology details and solar cell performance.

• Building a solid phenomenology for performance changes under various aging stresses.

• Close cooperation with our teams for opto-electrical characterization and chemical- and interface analysis for failure analysis and scientific understanding of the degradation mechanisms.

• Hands-on testing of solar cells and modules in laboratory solar simulators and degradation tests.

• Being in charge of operating and maintaining equipment in the R&D lab (performing experiments, organizing the maintenance, ensuring proper and safe operation of the tool, calibration – when necessary). Support potential future upgrades of some tools.

• Regularly report results to the project team and to the management.

The candidate will integrate a dynamic and talented team driven by innovation and results.

Expected profile

Contact

Cover letter and CV to be sent to : nils.harder@total.com
Specify the title of the offer in the subject line of the email