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Title: Suppressing defects through the synergistic effect of a Lewis base and a Lewis acid for highly efficient and stable perovskite solar cells

Abstract

Achieving long-term operational stability at a high efficiency level for perovskite solar cells is the most challenging issue toward commercialization of this emerging photovoltaic technology. Here, we investigated the cooperation of a Lewis base and a Lewis acid by combining commercial bis-PCBM mixed isomers as the Lewis acid in the antisolvent and N-(4-bromophenyl)thiourea (BrPh-ThR) as the Lewis base in the perovskite solution precursor. The combination of the Lewis base and the Lewis acid synergistically passivates Pb2+ and PbX3– antisite defects, enlarges the perovskite grain size, and improves charge-carrier separation and transport, leading to improved device efficiency from 19.3% to 21.7%. In addition, this Lewis base and acid combination also suppresses moisture incursion and passivates pinholes generated in the hole-transporting layer. Furthermore, the unsealed devices remained at 93% of the initial efficiency value in ambient air (10–20% relative humidity) after 3600 h at 20–25 °C and dropped by 10% after 1500 h under continuous operation at 1-sun illumination and 55 °C in nitrogen with maximum power-point tracking.

Authors:
ORCiD logo [1];  [2];  [3]; ORCiD logo [4]; ORCiD logo [4]; ORCiD logo [4]; ORCiD logo [3]; ORCiD logo [4];  [3]
  1. National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States); Ecole Polytechnique Federal de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne (Switzerland)
  2. Sun Yat-sen Univ., Guangzhou (People's Republic of China)
  3. Ecole Polytechnique Federal de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne (Switzerland)
  4. National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE)
OSTI Identifier:
1478732
Alternate Identifier(s):
OSTI ID: 1478267
Report Number(s):
NREL/JA-5900-71829
Journal ID: ISSN 1754-5692; EESNBY
Grant/Contract Number:  
AC36-08GO28308
Resource Type:
Journal Article: Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
Energy & Environmental Science
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 11; Journal Issue: 12; Journal ID: ISSN 1754-5692
Publisher:
Royal Society of Chemistry
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
14 SOLAR ENERGY; 36 MATERIALS SCIENCE; perovskite solar cells; stability; efficiency; photovoltaics; Lewis base; Lewis acid

Citation Formats

Zhang, Fei, Bi, Dongqin, Pellet, Norman, Xiao, Chuanxiao, Li, Zhen, Berry, Joseph J., Zakeeruddin, Shaik Mohammed, Zhu, Kai, and Grätzel, Michael. Suppressing defects through the synergistic effect of a Lewis base and a Lewis acid for highly efficient and stable perovskite solar cells. United States: N. p., 2018. Web. doi:10.1039/C8EE02252F.
Zhang, Fei, Bi, Dongqin, Pellet, Norman, Xiao, Chuanxiao, Li, Zhen, Berry, Joseph J., Zakeeruddin, Shaik Mohammed, Zhu, Kai, & Grätzel, Michael. Suppressing defects through the synergistic effect of a Lewis base and a Lewis acid for highly efficient and stable perovskite solar cells. United States. https://doi.org/10.1039/C8EE02252F
Zhang, Fei, Bi, Dongqin, Pellet, Norman, Xiao, Chuanxiao, Li, Zhen, Berry, Joseph J., Zakeeruddin, Shaik Mohammed, Zhu, Kai, and Grätzel, Michael. 2018. "Suppressing defects through the synergistic effect of a Lewis base and a Lewis acid for highly efficient and stable perovskite solar cells". United States. https://doi.org/10.1039/C8EE02252F. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1478732.
@article{osti_1478732,
title = {Suppressing defects through the synergistic effect of a Lewis base and a Lewis acid for highly efficient and stable perovskite solar cells},
author = {Zhang, Fei and Bi, Dongqin and Pellet, Norman and Xiao, Chuanxiao and Li, Zhen and Berry, Joseph J. and Zakeeruddin, Shaik Mohammed and Zhu, Kai and Grätzel, Michael},
abstractNote = {Achieving long-term operational stability at a high efficiency level for perovskite solar cells is the most challenging issue toward commercialization of this emerging photovoltaic technology. Here, we investigated the cooperation of a Lewis base and a Lewis acid by combining commercial bis-PCBM mixed isomers as the Lewis acid in the antisolvent and N-(4-bromophenyl)thiourea (BrPh-ThR) as the Lewis base in the perovskite solution precursor. The combination of the Lewis base and the Lewis acid synergistically passivates Pb2+ and PbX3– antisite defects, enlarges the perovskite grain size, and improves charge-carrier separation and transport, leading to improved device efficiency from 19.3% to 21.7%. In addition, this Lewis base and acid combination also suppresses moisture incursion and passivates pinholes generated in the hole-transporting layer. Furthermore, the unsealed devices remained at 93% of the initial efficiency value in ambient air (10–20% relative humidity) after 3600 h at 20–25 °C and dropped by 10% after 1500 h under continuous operation at 1-sun illumination and 55 °C in nitrogen with maximum power-point tracking.},
doi = {10.1039/C8EE02252F},
url = {https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1478732}, journal = {Energy & Environmental Science},
issn = {1754-5692},
number = 12,
volume = 11,
place = {United States},
year = {Mon Oct 08 00:00:00 EDT 2018},
month = {Mon Oct 08 00:00:00 EDT 2018}
}

Journal Article:
Free Publicly Available Full Text
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Cited by: 227 works
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Figures / Tables:

Figure 1 Figure 1: (a) Schematic diagram of antisolvent process; (b) Schematic reaction process of perovskite growth resulting from combination of the Lewis base BrPh-ThR in the perovskite-solution precursor and the Lewis acid bis-PCBM in the antisolvent process.

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Figures/Tables have been extracted from DOE-funded journal article accepted manuscripts.