15 May 2023
The solar folding roof HORIZON is a lightweight construction with a rope-based supporting structure concept and a patented folding mechanism which enables the dual use of industrial and traffic areas for the production of photovoltaic energy. Source: www.dhp-technology.ch
A project financed by Horizon Europe
Horizon Europe is the EU’s key funding programme for research and innovation with a budget of €95.5 billion. It tackles climate change, helps to achieve the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and boosts the EU’s competitiveness and growth.
The MC2.0 project, funded under the Climate, Energy and Mobily program (HORIZON.2.5) started in January 2023 and will end in February 2026.
Intro
In the last 25 years, many integrated photovoltaics (IPV) products have been introduced and demonstrated. Mostly BIPV products, but more recently also IIPV (Infrastructure-Integrated Photovoltaic) and VIPV (Vehicle-Integrated Photovoltaics) products. However, large scale deployment and massive market adoption of these technologies and products have not yet taken place.
We are at the brink of a huge scale-up and capacity build-up of PV in Europe, that will have a large effect on our living environment. Therefore, it is now urgent and essential that IPV products become widely available and affordable. This is important (1) to generate solar electricity where the demand is (in the built environment) and (2) to enable multifunctional use of area and space in the built environment.
Several parties in the MC2.0 consortium have more than 20 years of experience in IPV development and as such have been involved in many earlier projects and studies. We believe that the number one barrier for large scale market uptake of IPV is the high cost. Other – secondary but also important – barriers are immature sector cooperation and certification issues.
Aim of the project
The overarching ambition of the MC2.0 project is to demonstrate a cost breakthrough for IPV by means of an advanced manufacturing approach, referred to as “mass customization”. In coherence with this approach, we will contribute to solving the other identified barriers.
To realize this ambition, the MC2.0 consortium brings together experts and companies for PV laminates materials (including PV cells), on manufacturing of PV laminates, on manufacturing of IPV products and on market and application of IPV products.
