Proceedings of Perovskite Thin Film Photovoltaics (ABXPV)
Publication date: 14th December 2015
In recent years, redox mediators based on transition metals complexes have been studied, particularly those containing cobalt due their advantages compared to iodide mediators, such as reducing the driving force necessary for the dye regeneration hence optimizing the photovoltage device [1]. However, liquid electrolytes are problematic from manufacturing and user points of view. An efficient way to overcome this problem is the use of quasi-solid electrolyte based on polymers because of their excellent properties such as easy preparation (e.g. printing [2]), low cost and trapping of the liquid efficiently. It is necessary to consider that the additive used to make the quasi-solid cells causes no degradation.
Here, we report the application of quasi-solid electrolyte prepared with 5% PEO-EM-AGE copolymer, [Co(bpy)3]2+/3+ redox couple and acetonitrile in dye solar cell sensitized with MK-2 dye. The cells with quasi-solid electrolyte showed almost the same initial efficiency as the cells with liquid electrolyte as well others similar parameters (Figure 1). The differences are mostly in the photocurrent: quasi-solid electrolyte gave 16 % less photocurrent compared to liquid electrolyte. Interestingly, the quantum efficiency measurements predict only 3 % difference in the photocurrent. So far we have measured that both type of electrolyte had the same behavior for 200 hours in 1 sun light soaking test. The PEO electrolyte shows promising performance and we are currently continuing the stability test for 1000 hours.