Solution-processed photoelectrodes for solar water splitting tandem cells

Kevin Sivula^a

Proceedings of International Conference on New Advances in Materials Research for Solar Fuels Production (SolarFuel14)

Montréal, Canada, 2014 June 25th - 26th

Organizer: Thomas Hamann

Invited Speaker, Kevin Sivula, presentation 023
Publication date: 16th April 2014

A device that can convert solar energy into a chemical fuel with good efficiency while also offering high stability and the capability to be constructed with widely available materials using inexpensive processing techniques is urgently needed. A practical and inexpensive device could be constructed with an n-type photoanode in tandem with a p-type photocathode. In this presentation I will describe our progress toward the development of solution-processed photoelectrodes and their application toward overall photoelectrochemical water splitting tandem cells. Firstly, the feasibility of n-type BiVO4 and p-type Cu2O for photoanode/photocathode tandem cell is evaluated. By employing water oxidation and reduction catalysts (Co-Pi and RuOx, respectively) together with an operating point analysis we show that an unassisted solar photocurrent density on the order of 1 mA cm–2 is possible in a tandem cell and moreover gain insight into routes for improvement. We further demonstrate the unassisted 2-electrode operation of the tandem cell in this system and show that light harvesting is an important limiting factor. As the light harvesting in a PEC tandem cell can be improved by using a photocathode with smaller bad-gap energy, I next describe efforts toward the development of a delafossite-type CuFeO2 and Cu2ZnSnS4 (CZTS) photocathodes. Both of these materials have a band-gap energy of ca. 1.5 eV, suggesting that STH efficiencies higher than 10% are feasible in a tandem device. Moreover their composition from earth abundant atoms accords with solar energy on a global scale. However, specific drawbacks have limited their application to water splitting to date. I describe these limitations and our efforts to overcome them.

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