Insights into mechanical compression and the enhancement in performance by Mg(OH)2 coating in flexible dye sensitized solar cells

Nirmal Peiris, T. A., Wijayantha, Upul and Garcia Canadas, Jorge 2014. Insights into mechanical compression and the enhancement in performance by Mg(OH)2 coating in flexible dye sensitized solar cells. Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics 16 , pp. 2912-2919. 10.1039/c3cp53260g

Full text not available from this repository.

Abstract

The engineering of flexible dye sensitized solar cells (DSCs) by mechanical compression is one of the methods that allow low temperature processing of these devices. However, suppressing the high temperature sintering process significantly reduces the performance of the cells. In our previous work [J. Phys. Chem. C, 116 (2012) 1211] we have attempted to improve flexible DSC performance by coating TiO2 photoanode with an electrodeposited Mg(OH)2 layer. In there we obtained one of the largest photovoltage reported in flexible DSCs (847 mV). In order to gain more insights into both the reasons for the poorer performance of compressed cells and the origin of the enhancement achieved by the Mg(OH)2 coating, we present here an in-depth study by means of electrochemical impedance spectroscopy, Mott-Schottky plots analysis and open-circuit voltage decays. The existence of a shunt resistance in the mechanically compressed cells is revealed, causing an additional drawback to the poor inter-particle necking. By introducing the Mg(OH)2 coating the recombination in the cell becomes significantly reduced, being the main effect responsible for the higher photovoltage achieved. Additionally, the coating and the compression cause modifications in the surface states and in the structure of the interfaces with the electrolyte. This induces TiO2 conduction band displacements and shifts of the relative position of the modified states that influence the performance.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Engineering
Subjects:	T Technology > TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General)
Additional Information:	Published online before print: 5 Dec 2013
Publisher:	Royal Society of Chemistry
ISSN:	1463-9076
Last Modified:	21 Feb 2019 09:26
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/53518

Citation Data

Cited 11 times in Scopus. View in Scopus. Powered By Scopus® Data

Actions (repository staff only)

Edit Item