Every time I see a headline about perovskites solar cells, I ask “what’s the longevity?” Efficiency is nice, but it doesn’t mean anything when perovskites degrade hard in less than a year.
The idea would be that they’re so cheap that we can plaster them on any surface that gets a bit of sunlight. Higher efficiency is better than lower efficiency, of course, but it’s not such a big deal when they’re so damn cheap. But they have to last.
This article doesn’t even seem to answer the longevity question.
I’m more concerned with longevity and use of more environmentally friendly materials with solar panels than efficiency. In about 30 years or so, they reach their end of life so there will be hazardous waste resulting from that.
Remember that solar just doesn’t stop working at some random day. The efficiency drops to where it makes sense to replace then people like me come in and buy the panels for pennies on the dollar because a 18% efficient panel will work just fine.
I thought that I had read that we are close to the theoretical max efficiency for solar. That may have been in a comment and completely false, but it may be something to look into if it interests you. If there is validity, then there just may not be enough room for those large jumps. I think making them out of safer materials and trying to make the mfg process greener would offset some of the shortcomings of efficiency.