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. 2018 Jul 2;8(42):24059-24067.
doi: 10.1039/c8ra02852d. eCollection 2018 Jun 27.

Solid-state dye-sensitized solar cells based on Zn1- x Sn x O nanocomposite photoanodes

Ayat Nasr El-Shazly  1 , Ahmed Esmail Shalan  1 , Mohamed Mohamed Rashad  1 , Elsayed Ali Abdel-Aal  1 , Ibrahim Ahmed Ibrahim  1 , Mohamed F El-Shahat  2
Affiliations

Solid-state dye-sensitized solar cells based on Zn1- x Sn x O nanocomposite photoanodes

Ayat Nasr El-Shazly et al. RSC Adv. .

Expression of concern in

Abstract

Solid-state dye-sensitized solar cells (ss-DSSCs) comprising Sn2+-substituted ZnO nanopowder were purposefully tailored via a co-precipitation method. The solar cells assembled in this work were sensitized with N719 ruthenium dye and insinuated with spiro-OMeTAD as a solid hole transport layer (HTL). Evidently, significant enhancement in cell efficiency was accomplished with Sn2+ ions-substituted ZnO photoelectrodes by maintaining the weight ratio of SnO at 5%. The overall power conversion efficiency was improved from 3.0% for the cell with pure ZnO to 4.3% for the cell with 5% SnO substitution. The improvement in the cell efficiency with Sn2+-substituted ZnO photoelectrodes is attributed to the considerably large surface area of the nanopowders for dye adsorption, efficient charge separation and the suppression of charge recombination provided by SnO. Furthermore, the energy distinction between the conduction band edges of SnO and ZnO implied a type II band alignment. Moreover, the durability as well as the stability of 15 assembled cells were studied to show the outstanding long-term stability of the devices made of Sn2+ ion substituted ZnO, and the PCE of each cell remained stable and ∼96% of its primary value was retained for up to 100 h. Subsequently, the efficacy was drastically reduced to ∼35% after 250 h of storage.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing financial interest.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1. (a) Schematic diagram and (b) energy level diagram of the FTO/TiO2 BL/Zn1−xSnxO/N719 dye/spiro-OMeTAD/Al device.
Fig. 2
Fig. 2. (a) XRD spectra of pure ZnO (blue color), Zn0.95Sn0.05O (purple color), Zn0.9Sn0.1O (red color) and Zn0.8Sn0.2O (black color). (b) Cross sectional view of solid-state DSSCs containing a bi-oxide Zn0.95Sn0.05O photoelectrode.
Fig. 3
Fig. 3. TEM images of (a) the pure ZnO, (b) Zn0.95Sn0.05O, (c) Zn0.9Sn0.1O and (d) Zn0.8Sn0.2O.
Fig. 4
Fig. 4. (a) Nitrogen adsorption–desorption isotherms surface area and (b) pore size distribution of pure ZnO, Zn0.95Sn0.05O, Zn0.9Sn0.1O and Zn0.8Sn0.2O.
Fig. 5
Fig. 5. (a) UV-vis and (b) band gap of pure ZnO, Zn0.95Sn0.05O, Zn0.9Sn0.1O and Zn0.8Sn0.2O.
Fig. 6
Fig. 6. (a) J–V curves, (b) IPCE spectra and (c) Nyquist diagrams of the impedance spectra of pure ZnO, Zn0.95Sn0.05O, Zn0.9Sn0.1O and Zn0.8Sn0.2O.
Fig. 7
Fig. 7. (a) The PCE distribution histogram and (b) the PCE evolution of encapsulated devices stored in ambient air for different time periods [pure ZnO, Zn0.95Sn0.05O, Zn0.9Sn0.1O and Zn0.8Sn0.2O].
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