Wednesday, 16 October 2019: 15:20
Room 224 (The Hilton Atlanta)
Sequential series multijunction dye-sensitized solar cells (SSM-DSCs) are mechanically stacked single illuminated area DSC devices wired in series to harness photovoltage. SSM-DSCs are strategically designed to optimally utilize the potential energy of photons in each region of the solar spectrum. For this study, strategies to minimize photon reflection losses from glass and glass-air interface and photon management are combined. With a judicious choice of the sensitizer, TiO2 film thickness, solution processable “CYTOP” antireflection coating and immersion oil SSM-DSCs with power conversion efficiency >10% and 2.3 V photovoltage were achieved. Importantly, the SSM-DSC efficiency was substantially higher than any single device in the stack. Furthermore, without external bias this SSM-DSC configuration shows an impressive overall solar-to-fuel conversion efficiency of 6% when powering IrO2 and Au2O3 electrocatalysts for CO2 and H2O to CO and H2 conversion in aqueous solution. Concept of photon management in SSM-DSCs, device engineering, and role of CYTOP will be covered in the talk.
