Photovoltaic performance of Organic Photovoltaics for indoor energy harvester

Abstract Wireless sensor network becomes widespread into home and offices to keep them comfort and save the energy. The battery-less wireless sensor nodes need the high performance indoor solar cells for stable and sustainable operation. Organic Photovoltaics (OPV) has great indoor photovoltaic performance because ultra-thin organic layer has strong absorption against the UV–visible spectrum that is good spectral matching with indoor lightings. In this study, OPV module has 8 cells in series and same size as the conventional amorphous silicon solar cells (a-Si) for indoor light harvesting. OPV and a-Si are measured their photovoltaic performance under the fluorescent light and demonstrated for energy harvester of wireless sensor network. The output power of OPV and a-Si is 43.4 μW cm −2 and 28.5 μW cm −2 at fluorescent light 1000lux respectively. The data transmission rate of the wireless sensor node driven by OPV is 30–40% improved under the dim light condition compared to a-Si.