The bright future of R2R up-scaling of hybrid and organic solar cells: High precision slot die-coating and high resolution ultra-fast laser structuring

Luca Lucera^a, Frank Fecher^a, Peter Kubis^a, Florian Machui^a, Madeleine Heyder^a, Hans-Dieter Schmidt^a, Hans-Joachim Egelhaaf^a, Christoph Brabec^a^,^b, Karen Forberich^b

^aSolar factory of the future - ZAE Bayern, Fürtherstrasse 250, Nürnberg, 90429, Germany

^bInstitute of Materials for Electronics and Energy Technology (I-MEET), Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nuremberg, Martensstrasse 7, Erlangen, 91058, Germany

International Conference on Hybrid and Organic Photovoltaics
Proceedings of International Conference on Hybrid and Organic Photovoltaics 2015 (HOPV15)

Roma, Italy, 2015 May 11th - 13th

Organizer: Filippo De Angelis

Oral, Luca Lucera, presentation 039
Publication date: 5th February 2015

The transfer from hero solar cells, produced in the lab, to entirely printed, high efficiency modules has so far been proven to be a difficult challenge. As new materials capable of delivering increasing performances become available, it is necessary to reconsider the up-scaling process, addressing the factors which lead to losses in efficiency. In order to tackle the challenge, which will decide whether or not printed photovoltaics will be commercially successful, we investigate both the optical (through a transfer matrix formalism method) and the electrical (through analytical simulations) losses taking place in the up-scaling process, considering a big variety of active layer materials delivering up to 30 mA/cm² of short circuit current. From these analyses it emerges that a proper choice of high quality electrode materials has to be made, in order to minimize the electrical losses. Suitable electrodes are, e.g., low-temperature solution processable silver inks with high reflectivity (up to 98% in the visible range) and low sheet resistances (0.1 ohm/sq) for opaque modules. For semitransparent electrodes, silver nanowires (transmission higher than 90% at 550 nm and sheet resistance lower than 10 ohm/sq) and high performance, ITO-free, sputtered dielectric/ metal/ dielectric electrodes (T around 90% at 550 nm and sheet resistance < 8 ohm/sq). Furthermore, the limitations of traditional printing techniques for the monolithical interconnection of cells to modules have to be overcome, in order to minimize the dead area in the modules. For this reason we prove ultra-fast (pulse duration of about 300 fs), high resolution (higher than 20 µm) laser structuring to open the way to a zero-loss transition from lab cells towards large area modules. New, commercially available and efficient materials, such as PTB7 and a gen-2 donor from Merck Chemical, will be introduced. Based on these materials, large area modules (> 35 cm²) were R2R processed and overall dead areas lower then 3% could be achieved, with total area efficiencies of around 70% of the reference cells. At last, we will describe our approach of identifying green solvents which guarantee the formation of a controlled microstructure in the active layer upon relatively fast drying at low temperatures, with no losses as compared to halogenated solvents.

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International Conference on Hybrid and Organic Photovoltaics

International Conference on Hybrid and Organic Photovoltaics (HOPV) is celebrated yearly in May. The main topics are the development, function and modeling of materials and devices for hybrid and organic solar cells. The field is now dominated by perovskite solar cells but also other hybrid technologies, as organic solar cells, quantum dot solar cells, and dye-sensitized solar cells and their integration into devices for photoelectrochemical solar fuel production.

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