Skip to content
Epishine's sunrise project

Co-funded by European Union’s LIFE programme

EN Co-funded by the EU_BLACK-png
facility-tornby-1-1
Life Sunrise conclusion

Project Achievements

The LIFE SUNRISE project has reached its conclusion after four years of developing, scaling and validating Epishine's indoor solar cell technology. What started as an ambitious plan to industrialise organic photovoltaics has resulted in an established roll-to-roll manufacturing process, an expanded product portfolio and real commercial deployments. With support from the EU LIFE programme, Epishine has successfully:

  • Industrialised production: Established and validated manufacturing processes with automated quality control, enabling the reliable production of indoor solar cells at commercial scale.
  • Validated the technology: Improved product performance, quality and environmental understanding through extensive testing, life cycle assessments and feedback from customers.
  • Enabled commercial deployment: Produced and shipped tens of thousands of solar modules, supporting applications ranging from consumer electronics and electronic shelf labels to wireless sensors and IoT devices.

The project has helped Epishine move from its first commercial product to a growing portfolio of indoor energy harvesting solutions, supported by an expanding customer base and partnerships. Perhaps most importantly, LIFE SUNRISE has demonstrated that printed indoor solar cells can move beyond laboratory development and become a practical, scalable alternative to disposable batteries in everyday electronics.

Although the project has ended, the work continues. The manufacturing capabilities, customer relationships and technical knowledge developed through LIFE SUNRISE provide a foundation for Epishine's continued growth and its mission to make electronics more sustainable.

We thank the European Union's LIFE programme, our project partners, customers and everyone who contributed to this journey.

LIFE SUNRISE was co-funded by the European Union under grant agreement No. 101074260.

Project Updates

Goals of the project

The LIFE SUNRISE project primarily aims to scale up and demonstrate Epishine's paradigm-shifting technology. This advancement will broaden access to innovative organic photovoltaic (OPV) solutions within the Internet of Things (IoT) context, and potentially, in Building-Integrated Photovoltaics (BIPV) in the long term. The project is focused on offering affordable organic solar cells in massive volumes, with a minimal climate impact during production.

Buildings in Europe are responsible for 40% of energy consumption and 36% of emissions. Thus, reducing the carbon footprint of buildings is vital to achieving the goals set by the European Commission. This initiative is particularly important in addressing the current challenges in sustainable building management.

Another significant issue in the EU is the massive amount of battery waste, with 200,000 tonnes of batteries sold annually and less than 50% being recycled. This not only creates a major waste problem but also limits the deployment of ubiquitous sensors, especially indoors, which is a critical barrier that the IoT sensor industry needs to overcome. The LIFE SUNRISE project aims to help the European Commission accelerate progress in preventing and mitigating battery waste in the IoT sector. In the long run, this could lead to an increase in the production of renewable energy, including BIPV.

The project represents a pioneering effort in demonstrating the effective production of innovative OPV solar cells, specifically for IoT applications. It includes building a pilot facility to validate the production components and systems at an industrially relevant scale and under full operating conditions. Epishine will demonstrate the OPV technology in partnership with five European associated partners from Sweden, Spain, Germany, and Switzerland.
The success of this pilot approach is crucial for replicating and scaling the technology to other sites across Europe and globally. A successful LIFE SUNRISE project will enable Epishine’s vision of creating a planetary impact by enabling organic solar power to be accessible everywhere.

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Life programme under the grant agreement No 101074260.
Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are, however, those of the authors only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.

Anders Elfwing
Project Manager
anders.elfwing@epishine.com