Optical and electrical modelling and characterization of dye-sensitized solar cells

Abstract

A route of optical and electrical modeling of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) has been developed and validated within a set of test structures. The optical model is based on one-dimensional semi-coherent optical simulator Sun Shine, in which nanoporous active layer was successfully modelled as effective medium layer with effective scattering of light at its front and back surface interface using effective roughness. The electrical model is based on a pseudo-homogeneous active layer using drift–diffusion transport equations for free electron and ion transport. In both models, input parameters have been extracted from measured performance of test devices and main optical and electrical losses have been quantitatively identified for ionic liquid based DSSC structures, having 7 or 14 μm thick active layer.