Mapping 30 years of sustainability of solar energy research in developing countries: Indonesia case

Research into converting solar light energy into electricity using so-called photovoltaic (PV) technology or solar cells (SCs) was started a long time ago. However, most developing countries tend to lag behind. The present work delivers a bibliometric mapping analysis of 30 years of Indonesian solar energy research papers in the Scopus database. A multidisciplinary point of view is used to cover the findings comprehensively, highlighting the emerging gaps, orientation, and promising future research that will benefit many researchers, governments, and industry. Two essential keywords, “photovoltaic” and “solar cell”, were used to harvest the data. A total of 1886 documents were finally investigated. The VOSviewer was utilized as a proper complement for visualizing and analyzing the publication trends based on the keywords and authorships. Many aspects of solar research have been explored, including the basic science of semiconductors, simulation, lab-scale device fabrication, and the application of technologies and policies. The findings show that the two keywords determined the research characteristics. It also reveals that the geographical location had a remarkable impact on publication distribution. The most striking result is that a minimum of 1146 documents are centralized on Java Island. In addition, the policies related to renewable energy show a strong impact: Two years after the policies were announced, the publications exhibited a two-fold increase. The results also suggest that future research should focus on the increasingly significant domestic component of silicon-based solar cells, the various multidisciplinary approaches for making PV utilization more affordable, and on shifting towards the use of perovskite solar cells. Solid national and international collaboration should be continued for the sustainability of Indonesian solar energy research.