Abstract

The rise in the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of perovskite solar cells has triggered enormous interest in perovskite-based tandem photovoltaics. One key challenge is to achieve high transmission of low energy photons into the bottom cell. Here, nanostructured front electrodes for 4-terminal perovskite/crystalline-silicon (perovskite/c-Si) tandem solar cells are developed by conformal deposition of indium tin oxide (ITO) on self-assembled polystyrene nanopillars. The nanostructured ITO is optimized for reduced reflection and increased transmission with a tradeoff in increased sheet resistance. In the optimum case, the nanostructured ITO electrodes enhance the transmittance by ∼7% (relative) compared to planar references. Perovskite/c-Si tandem devices with nanostructured ITO exhibit enhanced short-circuit current density (2.9 mA/cm2 absolute) and PCE (1.7% absolute) in the bottom c-Si solar cell compared to the reference. The improved light in-coupling is more pronounced for elevated angle of incidence. Energy yield enhancement up to ∼10% (relative) is achieved for perovskite/c-Si tandem architecture with the nanostructured ITO electrodes. It is also shown that these nanostructured ITO electrodes are also compatible with various other perovskite-based tandem architectures and bear the potential to improve the PCE up to 27.0%.

Highlights

  • During the last decade, organo-metal halide perovskite solar cells (PSCs) have witnessed a remarkable enhancement in the power conversion efficiency (PCE), surpassing 25% to date [1]

  • The series resistance (RS) in the J-V characteristic of the PSC is only slightly affected (RS of planar indium tin oxide (ITO)-PSC: 70.2 Ω and nanostructured ITO (NS ITO)-PSC: 81.4 Ω), indicating that the decreased conductivity is not too severe. These results suggest that NS ITO electrodes are very promising optically for the application in PSCs and tandem photovoltaics

  • NS ITO electrodes for perovskite/c-Si tandem solar cells are developed by sputtering ITO on self-assembled polystyrene nanopillars

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Summary

Introduction

Organo-metal halide perovskite solar cells (PSCs) have witnessed a remarkable enhancement in the power conversion efficiency (PCE), surpassing 25% to date [1]. Micron-scale textures at the front side of two-terminal (2 T) and four-terminal (4 T) device architectures have demonstrated to reduce the reflection losses, improving the light in-coupling and light trapping as well as enhancing the transmission of the low energy photons through the top solar cell into the bottom solar cell [8,9,14,19,20,21,22]. Mostly employed so far in 4 T architectures having front planar surfaces, and compatible with 2 T, makes use of retroreflector-inspired micron-scale pyramidal structures or micro-textured foils at the front side of the transparent cover of the device [8,9,20,22] These micro-textures reduce the reflection losses of the incident light by multiple interactions with the textured surface, which increases the probability for light in-coupling [23,24]. The 4 T PSC/c-Si tandem solar cells using nanostructured front electrodes show improved angular stability of light in-coupling, leading to an enhanced annual energy yield

Device fabrication
Characterization
Results and discussion
Photovoltaic performance
Opto-electronic properties of the optimized nanostructured ITO electrode
Influence of the average inter-distance between the nanostructures
Influence of incidence angle of irradiation and energy yield analysis
Outlook
Conclusion

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