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. 2024 Jan 15;15(1):136.
doi: 10.3390/mi15010136.

Green Anisole as Antisolvent in Planar Triple-Cation Perovskite Solar Cells with Varying Cesium Concentrations

Vera La Ferrara  1 , Antonella De Maria  1 , Gabriella Rametta  1
Affiliations

Green Anisole as Antisolvent in Planar Triple-Cation Perovskite Solar Cells with Varying Cesium Concentrations

Vera La Ferrara et al. Micromachines (Basel). .

Abstract

The feasibility of replacing toxic chlorobenzene antisolvents with environmentally friendly anisole in the fabrication of planar triple-cation perovskite solar cells was explored here. The successful integration of anisole not only ensures comparable device performance but also contributes to the development of more sustainable and green fabrication processes for next-generation photovoltaic technologies. Nevertheless, to ensure the possibility of achieving well-functioning unencapsulated devices whose working operation depends on outdoor atmospheric conditions, we found that adjusting the cesium concentrations in the perovskite layers enabled the electrical characterization of efficient devices even under high relative humidity conditions (more than 40%). We found that 10% of CsI in the precursor solution will make devices with low hysteresis indexes and sustained performance stability over a 90-day period both with cholorobenzene and anisole antisolvent. These results further confirm that green anisole can replace chlorobenzene as an antisolvent.

Keywords: ambient air; anisole; cesium; green antisolvent; perovskite; planar solar cell; stability; triple cation; unencapsulated.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Architecture of typical device.
Figure 2
Figure 2
(a) Transmittance and (b) absorbance of glass/ITO/SnO2 w/o PAL at different antisolvents and cesium concentration.
Figure 3
Figure 3
(a) Tauc plot and (b) urban energy of glass/ITO/SnO2/perovskite at different antisolvents and cesium concentration.
Figure 4
Figure 4
SEM images of perovskite (a) Cs5 CB; (b) Cs5 ANI (c) Cs10 CB (d) Cs10 ANI.
Figure 5
Figure 5
(a) Thickness of PALs acquired by FIB; (b) typical FIB cross-section of Cs10 ANI with different layers which compose the PSCs: ITO, about 180 nm, SnO2, about 54 nm, Cs10 ANI perovskite layer, about 342 nm and Spiro, about 200 nm.
Figure 6
Figure 6
Typical J-V forward and reverse of (a) Cs5 CB, (b) Cs5 ANI, (c) Cs10 CB and (d) Cs10 ANI. In the inset, a J-V graph of champion device Cs10 ANI is shown.
Figure 7
Figure 7
PCE measured during continuous illumination for typical devices (a) Cs10 CB and (b) Cs10 ANI.
Figure 8
Figure 8
PCE monitored over 90 days: (a) Cs5 and Cs10 with CB as antisolvent; and (b) Cs5 and Cs10 with ANI as antisolvent.
Figure 9
Figure 9
Statistics of electrical performance (a) open-circuit voltage, Voc, (b) short-circuit current density, Jsc, (c) fill factor, FF and (d) power conversion efficiency, PCE, of devices Cs10 with CB (blue dots)and ANI (red dots) as antisolvents: 20 devices realized using CB and 14 devices realized using ANI. The symbol inside the box marks the average value and the box encloses measurements within the standard deviation. The horizontal line inside the box marks the median value.
Figure 10
Figure 10
(a) Ideality factor Cs10 CB and Cs10 ANI; (b) dark J-V curves of the devices displaying the VTFL point.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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