Aluminum plasmonic nanoparticles enhanced dye sensitized solar cells

Qi Xu; Fang Liu; Yuxiang Liu; Weisi Meng; Kaiyu Cui; Xue Feng; Wei Zhang; Yidong Huang

doi:10.1364/OE.22.00A301

Optics Express
Vol. 22,
Issue S2,
pp. A301-A310
(2014)
•https://doi.org/10.1364/OE.22.00A301

Aluminum plasmonic nanoparticles enhanced dye sensitized solar cells

Qi Xu, Fang Liu, Yuxiang Liu, Weisi Meng, Kaiyu Cui, Xue Feng, Wei Zhang, and Yidong Huang

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Qi Xu, Fang Liu, Yuxiang Liu, Weisi Meng, Kaiyu Cui, Xue Feng, Wei Zhang, and Yidong Huang, "Aluminum plasmonic nanoparticles enhanced dye sensitized solar cells," Opt. Express 22, A301-A310 (2014)

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Abstract

We present an investigation on utilizing plasmonic aluminium (Al) nanoparticles (NPs) to enhance the optical absorption of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs). The Al NPs exhibit not only the light absorption enhancement in solar cells with localized surface plasmon (LSP) effect but also the chemical stability to iodide/triiodide electrolyte. Besides, the lower work function (~4.06 eV), compared with that of TiO₂ (~4.6 eV), may suppress the quenching processes, such as charge transfer to metal NPs, to reduce the loss. Thus, high concentration of Al NPs could be incorporated into the TiO₂ anodes, and the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of DSCs is improved by nearly 13%. Moreover, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) characterization also indicates that the plasmonic DSCs with Al NPs present better electrochemical performance than regular ones, which contributes to the improvement of PCE of the device.

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Fig. 1 (a) Schematic structure of plasmonic Aluminum (Al) nanoparticles (NPs) enhanced dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs). (b) Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) image of Al NPs. (c) Energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) measurement result of Al NPs. (d) Calculated optical absorption of Al NPs (black curve) and measured optical absorption of Al NPs (red curve) and Al₂O₃ NPs (blue curve) in ethanol solutions. The concentrations of Al NPs and Al₂O₃ NPs are the same. Inset: The calculated LSP field distribution of the 50nm Al NP illuminated by incident light at wavelengths of 380 nm.

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Fig. 2 (a) Optical Absorption of dye-sensitized TiO₂ anodes incorporated with/without Al NPs. (b) The photocurrent density-voltage characteristics (J-V curves) of DSCs incorporated with Al or Al₂O₃ NPs and TiO₂-only DSCs. The TiO₂ anodes are composed of 3μm active layers (25nm TiO₂ NPs).

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Fig. 3 (a) The J-V curves of DSCs incorporated with Al NPs at optimised concentration of 0.75 wt% and TiO₂-only DSCs, the TiO₂ anodes are composed of 8μm active layers (25nm TiO₂ NPs) and 2μm scattering layers (200 nm TiO₂ NPs). (b) Incident photon-to-electron conversion efficiency (IPCE) of Al NPs enhanced DSCs and TiO₂-only DSCs.

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Fig. 4 Electrochemical impedance spectra (EIS) of DSCs incorporated with/without Al NPs. Inset is the equivalent circuit.

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Fig. 5 Optical absorption of Al NPs in ethanol solution before/after being mixed with electrolyte.

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Fig. 6 The calculated LSP field distribution of the Al NP with the diameter D of 20nm (left) and 50nm (right) which is illuminated by incident light at wavelengths of 360 nm (left) and 350nm (right).

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Tables (2)

Table 1 Performance of DSCs composed of 8μm active layers and 2μm scattering layers.

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Table 2 Electrochemical impedance spectra (EIS) properties of DSCs incorporated with/without Al NPs.

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D_{N P s} = \frac{N_{N P s}}{V_{T i O_{2}}} = \frac{m_{N P s}}{m_{N P} \times V_{T i O_{2}}} = \frac{m_{N P s} \times ρ_{T i O_{2}}}{V_{N P} \times ρ_{m e t a l} \times V_{T i O_{2}} \times ρ_{T i O_{2}}} = \frac{ρ_{T i O_{2}}}{V_{N P} \times ρ_{m e t a l}} \times \frac{m_{N P s}}{m_{T i O_{2}}}

*Device*	*Composition*	*V_oc (V)*	*J_sc (mA/cm²)*	*FF (%)*	*PCE (%)*
1	TiO₂-only	0.716 ± 0.05	15.18 ± 0.02	56.6 ± 0.1	6.15 ± 0.1
2	0.25 wt % Al NPs	0.719 ± 0.09	15.39 ± 0.04	56.1 ± 0.2	6.25 ± 0.1
3	0.75 wt % Al NPs	0.720 ± 0.08	17.61 ± 0.03	56.3 ± 0.2	6.95 ± 0.1
4	1.50 wt % Al NPs	0.721 ± 0.10	15.37 ± 0.02	57.5 ± 0.1	6.36 ± 0.1
5	7.5 wt% Al NPs	0.717 ± 0.11	14.64 ± 0.02	55.9 ± 0.3	5.88 ± 0.1

Device	Composition	R_s (Ω)	R₂ (Ω)	f_max (Hz)	τ (s)
1	TiO₂-only	28.59	62.98	11.91	0.084
2	0.25 wt % Al NPs	31.25	53.95	10.79	0.093
3	0.75 wt % Al NPs	33.52	27.89	8.07	0.124
4	1.50 wt % Al NPs	35.53	47.79	9.89	0.101

*Device*	*Composition*	*V_oc (V)*	*J_sc (mA/cm²)*	*FF (%)*	*PCE (%)*
1	TiO₂-only	0.716 ± 0.05	15.18 ± 0.02	56.6 ± 0.1	6.15 ± 0.1
2	0.25 wt % Al NPs	0.719 ± 0.09	15.39 ± 0.04	56.1 ± 0.2	6.25 ± 0.1
3	0.75 wt % Al NPs	0.720 ± 0.08	17.61 ± 0.03	56.3 ± 0.2	6.95 ± 0.1
4	1.50 wt % Al NPs	0.721 ± 0.10	15.37 ± 0.02	57.5 ± 0.1	6.36 ± 0.1
5	7.5 wt% Al NPs	0.717 ± 0.11	14.64 ± 0.02	55.9 ± 0.3	5.88 ± 0.1

Device	Composition	R_s (Ω)	R₂ (Ω)	f_max (Hz)	τ (s)
1	TiO₂-only	28.59	62.98	11.91	0.084
2	0.25 wt % Al NPs	31.25	53.95	10.79	0.093
3	0.75 wt % Al NPs	33.52	27.89	8.07	0.124
4	1.50 wt % Al NPs	35.53	47.79	9.89	0.101

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