Proceedings of nanoGe Fall Meeting 2018 (NFM18)
DOI: https://doi.org/10.29363/nanoge.nfm.2018.151
Publication date: 6th July 2018
The operational lifetime and scale-up of quantum dot sensitized solar cells (QDSCs) are largely limited by the hole transport layer, which is usually an aqueous polysulfide solution. The liquid, and alkaline nature of this electrolyte makes it difficult to develop laminated sealed devices. Further, the polysulfide electrolyte composition alters with use (there are observable color and viscosity variations!) thus impacting the cell performance. Besides the photoanode, the counter electrode (CE) also plays a key role in controlling cell response. While a variety of CEs have been attempted in the past: metallic coatings, carbon nanomaterials and conducting polymers, poly(3,4-ethylenedioxypyrrole) or PEDOP has rarely been used in QDSCs.
In view of the above described issues, in this report, QDSCs with a photoanode comprising of N-doped graphene quantum dots (N-GQDs) and cadmium sulfide (CdS)/titania (TiO2) based solar cells with electropolymerized PEDOP@carbon cloth as CE and a polysulfide/SiO2 gel with an electrolyte additive, namely, sodium poly(styrene sulfonate) or NaPSS were developed. The proportion of NaPSS is optimized on the basis of cell performance. A significant improvement in QDSC performance is obtained by incorporating NaPSS in the gel. By using impedance spectroscopy, the role of NaPSS in improving the cell performance is determined. NaPSS increases the recombination resistance for back electron transfer at the photoanode/electrolyte interface, thus increasing the power conversion efficiency to nearly 7% from 6.1% (when no NaPSS is present). NaPSS also imparts an enhanced operational life to the QDSC. Apart from NaPSS, the effectivity of PEDOP as a CE for QDSCs is studied by comparing impedance parameters, electrocatalytic activities and electrical conductivities of PEDOP films with different dopants. Ionically conducting and electrically conducting dopants were attempted. These studies provide a deeper understanding of factors that limit QDSC performances, and help in overcoming them.
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