Advances in hole transport materials engineering for stable and efficient perovskite solar cells

Materials for downconversion in solar cells: Perspectives and challenges

A Review of Inorganic Hole Transport Materials for Perovskite Solar Cells

United Nations adopted Sustainable Development Goals to ensure prosperity, reduction of poverty and mitigation of climate change. Energy is a part of these goals. Today, energy demand heavily relies on the fossil fuel sources: petroleum, natural gas, coal etc., which causes greenhouse gas emission and environmental deterioration. In order to avoid environmental impacts, current energy systems need to transform into clean and renewable sources of energy systems. Deployment of solar energy, an omnipresent renewable energy source, is gaining popularity due to the easiness of installation, availability and competitive cost. For effective utilization and higher penetration of solar energy, knowledge about technology and performance of solar energy system is required. In this paper, different solar photovoltaic (SPV) technology and mathematical modeling to characterize the SPV systems are comprehensively presented. The performance analysis on the basis of standard parameters like performance ratio, yield energy, reference energy, capacity utilization factor etc. and on the basis of exergy as well as energy efficiency are also presented. Variation in environmental conditions significantly affects the outdoor performance and operation of SPV systems. Therefore, study of degradation and failure modes is important for accurate prediction of performance of SPV systems and has been discussed.

Performance assessment and degradation analysis of solar photovoltaic technologies: A review

Photovoltaic (PV) module costs have declined rapidly over forty years but the reasons remain elusive. Here we advance a conceptual framework and quantitative method for quantifying the causes of cost changes in a technology, and apply it to PV modules. Our method begins with a cost model that breaks down cost into variables that changed over time. Cost change equations are then derived to quantify each variable's contribution. We distinguish between changes observed in variables of the cost model – which we term low-level mechanisms of cost reduction – and research and development, learning-by-doing, and scale economies, which we refer to as high-level mechanisms. We find that increased module efficiency was the leading low-level cause of cost reduction in 1980–2012, contributing almost 25% of the decline. Government-funded and private R&D was the most important high-level mechanism over this period. After 2001, however, scale economies became a more significant cause of cost reduction, approaching R&D in importance. Policies that stimulate market growth have played a key role in enabling PV's cost reduction, through privately-funded R&D and scale economies, and to a lesser extent learning-by-doing. The method presented here can be adapted to retrospectively or prospectively study many technologies, and performance metrics besides cost.

Evaluating the causes of cost reduction in photovoltaic modules

http://yoksis.bilkent.edu.tr/pdf/files/8391.pdf

Effect of gold nanoparticles size on light scattering for thin film amorphous-silicon solar cells

High performance graphene-silicon Schottky junction solar cells with HfO2 interfacial layer grown by atomic layer deposition

In this paper, we investigate perovskite planar heterojunction solar cells using 2D physics-based TCAD simulation. The perovskite cell is modeled as an inorganic material with physics-based parameters. A planar structure consisting of $$\hbox {TiO}_{2}$$TiO2 as the electron transport material (ETM), $$\hbox {CH}_{3}\hbox {NH}_{3}\hbox {PbI}_3{}_{-\mathrm{x}}\hbox {Cl}_\mathrm{x}$$CH3NH3PbI3-xClx as the absorber layer, and Spiro-OmeTAD as the hole transport material (HTM) is simulated. The simulated results match published experimental results indicating the accuracy of the physics-based model. Using this model, the effect of the hole mobility and electron affinity/band gap of the hole transport layer (HTM) is investigated. The results show that in order to achieve high efficiency, the mobility of the HTM layer should exceed $$10^{-4}\hbox {cm}^{2}/\hbox {V s}$$10-4cm2/V s. In addition, reducing the band offset to match the valance band of the perovskite results in achieving the highest efficiency. Moreover, the results are discussed in terms of charge transport in the HTM layer and the band alignment at the HTM/perovskite interface.

Effect of mobility and band structure of hole transport layer in planar heterojunction perovskite solar cells using 2D TCAD simulation

The recent progress in graphene (Gr)/silicon (Si) Schottky barrier solar cells (SBSC) has shown the potential to produce low cost and high efficiency solar cells. Among the different approaches to improve the performance of Gr/Si SBSC is engineering the interface with an interfacial layer to reduce the high recombination at the graphene (Gr)/silicon (Si) interface and facilitate the transport of photo-generated carriers. Herein, we demonstrate improved performance of Gr/Si SBSC by engineering the interface with an aluminum oxide (Al2O3) layer grown by atomic layer deposition (ALD). With the introduction of an Al2O3 interfacial layer, the Schottky barrier height is increased from 0.843 V to 0.912 V which contributed to an increase in the open circuit voltage from 0.45 V to 0.48 V. The power conversion efficiency improved from 7.2% to 8.7% with the Al2O3 interfacial layer. The stability of the Gr/Al2O3/Si devices was further investigated and the results have shown a stable performance after four weeks of operation. The findings of this work underpin the potential of using an Al2O3 interfacial layer to enhance the performance and stability of Gr/Si SBSC.

/pdf/interface-engineering-of-graphene-silicon-schottky-junction-2uk6ailz9w.pdf

Aaesha Alnuaimi

Papers

Effect of gold nanoparticles size on light scattering for thin film amorphous-silicon solar cells

High performance graphene-silicon Schottky junction solar cells with HfO2 interfacial layer grown by atomic layer deposition

Effect of mobility and band structure of hole transport layer in planar heterojunction perovskite solar cells using 2D TCAD simulation

Interface engineering of graphene–silicon Schottky junction solar cells with an Al2O3 interfacial layer grown by atomic layer deposition

Reduction of interface traps at the amorphous-silicon/crystalline-silicon interface by hydrogen and nitrogen annealing