Abstract
The emergence of perovskite solar cells (PSCs) in a "catfish effect" of other conventional photovoltaic technologies with the massive growth of high-power conversion efficiency (PCE) has given a new direction to the entire solar energy field. Replacing traditional metal-based electrodes with carbon-based materials is one of the front-runners among many other investigations in this field due to its cost-effective processability and high stability. Carbon-based perovskite solar cells (c-PSCs) have shown great potential for the development of large scale photovoltaics. First of its kind, here we introduce a facile and cost-effective large scale carbon nanoparticles (CNPs) synthesis from mustard oil assisted cotton combustion for utilization in the mesoporous carbon-based perovskite solar cell (PSC). Also, we instigate two different directions of utilizing the carbon nanoparticles for a composite high temperature processed electrode (HTCN) and a low temperature processed electrode (LTCN) with detailed performance comparison. NiO/CNP composite thin film was used in high temperature processed electrodes, and for low temperature processed electrodes, separate NiO and CNP layers were deposited. The HTCN devices with the cell structure FTO/c-TiO2/m-TiO2/m-ZrO2/high-temperature NiO-CNP composite paste/infiltrated MAPI (CH3NH3PbI3) achieved a maximum PCE of 13.2%. In addition, high temperature based carbon devices had remarkable stability of ~ 1000 h (ambient condition), retaining almost 90% of their initial efficiency. In contrast, LTCN devices with configuration FTO/c-TiO2/m-TiO2/m-ZrO2/NiO/MAPI/low-temperature CNP had a PCE limit of 14.2%, maintaining ~ 72% of the initial PCE after 1000 h. Nevertheless, we believe this promising approach and the comparative study between the two different techniques would be highly suitable and adequate for the upcoming cutting-edge experimentations of PSC.
Highlights
The emergence of perovskite solar cells (PSCs) in a "catfish effect" of other conventional photovoltaic technologies with the massive growth of high-power conversion efficiency (PCE) has given a new direction to the entire solar energy field
The synthesized carbon nanoparticles (CNPs) were characterized by Raman spectra, XRD (X-ray diffraction), TEM and high-resolution TEM (HRTEM) along with selected area electron diffraction (SAED)
Aloe vera based CNPs and candle soot are highly promising with respect to their conductivity and thermal stability[46,50]
Summary
The emergence of perovskite solar cells (PSCs) in a "catfish effect" of other conventional photovoltaic technologies with the massive growth of high-power conversion efficiency (PCE) has given a new direction to the entire solar energy field. The collected CNP was used as a low-temperature counter electrode as well as a composite high-temperature counter electrode with NiO (HTM) for different types of perovskite devices These two different routes can give us the time of production, cost of production and reliability of the entire fabrication processes, and performance behaviour to understand their individual efficacy. Observed trends exhibit that the low-temperature electrode-based device with CNP can achieve the best PCE of ~ 14.2% compared to ~ 13.2% PCE of high-temperature-carbon-based devices, the stability of HTCN (high-temperature carbon nanoparticles) devices is higher than that of the LTCN (low-temperature carbon nanoparticles) devices This comparative analysis can lead us to understand the favourable process for large scale fabrication of CNP counter electrode perovskite solar cell (c-PSC) towards commercialization. From 30 mg of cotton wicks, 100 mg of carbon nanoparticles were obtained, indicating that large-scale synthesis is highly possible using this method
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
