Researchers from the Australian National University and the University of New South Wales have set an efficiency record for the direct production of renewable hydrogen from solar energy using low-cost materials, reports Renew Economy.

The teams used leading innovations in next-generation ‘tandem’ solar cells, combined with advances in electrolysis techniques to achieve a solar-to-hydrogen conversion efficiency of greater than 20 percent.

These low-cost silicon-perovskite tandem solar cells, optimised for the production of hydrogen, combined two types of solar cells layered on top of each other to achieve a combined efficiency of 24.3 percent – an efficiency higher than most conventional silicon solar cells.