Publication date: 23rd October 2020
Low operational stability of perovskite solar cells represents a major obstacle for the practical implementation of this technology. In that context, ZnO may be considered as a promising electron transport material with suppressed oxidizing and photocatalytic activity as compared to SnO2 or TiO2. However, the first studies revealed the chemical instability of the interface formed between the lead halide perovskites and zinc oxide, whereas the underlying reasons are still under active debates. Still, the interfacial instability issues made ZnO a largely overlooked electron transport material despite its excellent optoelectronic properties.
In this talk, we present findings outlining the factors affecting the stability of the perovskite cells using ZnO electron transport layer (ETL) material. We found that the perovskite precursor chemistry plays a key role in the stabilization of the cells with this electron-transport layer. We show that, whilee using specific absorber and precursor formulations, the solar cells using ZnO demonstrate much superior operational stability compared to the devices that utilize SnO2 or TiO2 ETLs.
To further increase the lifetime of the perovskite solar cells using ZnO ETL, we developed a novel approach to the zinc oxide surface modification with methylammonium iodide that suppresses interfacial reactions with the adjacent perovskite absorber layer. The application of Cs0.12[HC(NH2)2]0.88PbI3 as absorber material in devices with the modified ZnO electron transport layer resulted in 82% retention of the initial efficiency after aging for 2100 hours at 50 mW cm-2 and 65°C. We attribute the revealed stabilization effect of the methylammonium iodide treatment to passivation of the reactive ZnO surface and inhibiting the parasitic interfacial chemistry leading to the lead iodide formation.
This work has been supported by the Russian Science Foundation (project No 18-72-00179) at Skoltech. The device stability studies were supported by RSF project No 19-73-30020 at IPCP RAS. S.O. would like to thank ETN Juelich for funding under the grant SCALEUP (SOLAR-ERA.NET Cofund 2, id: 32).
nanoGe is a prestigious brand of successful science conferences that are developed along the year in different areas of the world since 2009. Our worldwide conferences cover cutting-edge materials topics like perovskite solar cells, photovoltaics, optoelectronics, solar fuel conversion, surface science, catalysis and two-dimensional materials, among many others.
Previously nanoGe Spring Meeting (NSM) and nanoGe Fall Meeting (NFM), MATSUS is a multiple symposia conference focused on a broad set of topics of advanced materials preparation, their fundamental properties, and their applications, in fields such as renewable energy, photovoltaics, lighting, semiconductor quantum dots, 2-D materials synthesis, charge carriers dynamics, microscopy and spectroscopy semiconductors fundamentals, etc.
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.
Asia-Pacific International Conference on Perovskite, Organic Photovoltaics and Optoelectronics
The main topics of the Asia-Pacific International Conference on Perovskite, Organic Photovoltaics and Optoelectronics (IPEROP) are discussed every year in Asia-Pacific for gathering the recent advances in the fields of material preparation, modeling and fabrication of perovskite and hybrid and organic materials. Photovoltaic devices are analyzed from fundamental physics and materials properties to a broad set of applications. The conference also covers the developments of perovskite optoelectronics, including light-emitting diodes, lasers, optical devices, nanophotonics, nonlinear optical properties, colloidal nanostructures, photophysics and light-matter coupling.
The International Conference on Perovskite Thin Film Photovoltaics Perovskite Photonics and Optoelectronics (NIPHO) is the best place to hear the latest developments in perovskite solar cells as well as on recent advances in the fields of perovskite light-emitting diodes, lasers, optical devices, nanophotonics, nonlinear optical properties, colloidal nanostructures, photophysics and light-matter coupling.