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Co-deposition of hole-selective contact and absorber for improving the processability of perovskite solar cells

Nature Energy volume 8, pages 462–472 (2023)Cite this article

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Abstract

Simplifying the manufacturing processes of renewable energy technologies is crucial to lowering the barriers to commercialization. In this context, to improve the manufacturability of perovskite solar cells (PSCs), we have developed a one-step solution-coating procedure in which the hole-selective contact and perovskite light absorber spontaneously form, resulting in efficient inverted PSCs. We observed that phosphonic or carboxylic acids, incorporated into perovskite precursor solutions, self-assemble on the indium tin oxide substrate during perovskite film processing. They form a robust self-assembled monolayer as an excellent hole-selective contact while the perovskite crystallizes. Our approach solves wettability issues and simplifies device fabrication, advancing the manufacturability of PSCs. Our PSC devices with positive–intrinsic–negative (p-i-n) geometry show a power conversion efficiency of 24.5% and retain >90% of their initial efficiency after 1,200 h of operating at the maximum power point under continuous illumination. The approach shows good generality as it is compatible with different self-assembled monolayer molecular systems, perovskites, solvents and processing methods.

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Fig. 1: Perovskite thin-film preparation and characterization.
Fig. 2: Characterization of SAM formation, energetic alignment and carrier lifetime.
Fig. 3: Device photovoltaic characteristics and stability.
Fig. 4: Blade coating of PSCs and evaluation of different PAs.
Fig. 5: Evaluation of different SAM molecular systems and solvents.

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All data generated or analysed during this study are included in the published article and its Supplementary Information.

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Acknowledgements

This work was authored in part by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, operated by Alliance for Sustainable Energy, for the US Department of Energy (DOE) under contract no. DE-AC36-08GO28308. This work was primarily supported as part of the Center for Hybrid Organic-Inorganic Semiconductors for Energy (CHOISE), an Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Office of Science within the US DOE. The scalable manufacturing work carried out at the NREL was supported by the US DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) under the Solar Energy Technologies Office (SETO) Advanced Perovskite Cells and Modules program of the National Center for Photovoltaics. The work at City University of Hong Kong was supported by the Innovation and Technology Fund (GHP/102/20GD, Hong Kong). The work at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) was supported by an NPRP grant (NPRP11S-1231-170150) from the Qatar National Research Fund (a member of the Qatar Foundation) and the Valais Energy Demonstrators Fund. T.L., H.P. and K.R.G. acknowledge funding from the National Science Foundation under award nos. OIA-1929131 (T.L. and K.R.G) and 2102257 (H.P. and K.R.G). The work at Brown University was supported by the Office of Naval Research (grant no. N00014-20-1-2574) and the US DOE’s EERE through SETO award no. DE-0009511. The views expressed in the article do not necessarily represent the views of the US DOE or the US Government.

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Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Xiaopeng Zheng, Zhen Li, Yi Zhang, Min Chen.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Golden, CO, USA

    Xiaopeng Zheng, Min Chen, Chuanxiao Xiao, Jay B. Patel, Darius Kuciauskas, Rebecca A. Scheidt, Steven P. Harvey, Brian M. Wieliczka, Ahmad R. Kirmani, Michael D. McGehee & Joseph M. Luther

  2. Department of Chemistry, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon, Hong Kong

    Zhen Li, Danpeng Gao, Chunlei Zhang & Zonglong Zhu

  3. Institute of Chemical Sciences and Engineering, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Sion, Switzerland

    Yi Zhang & Mohammad Khaja Nazeeruddin

  4. Department of Chemistry, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY, USA

    Tuo Liu, Henry Pruett & Kenneth R. Graham

  5. Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, and Materials Science and Engineering, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA

    Jay B. Patel, Artiom Magomedov, Daniel Morales & Michael D. McGehee

  6. Department of Organic Chemistry, Kaunas University of Technology, Kaunas, Lithuania

    Artiom Magomedov

  7. Department of Physics and Astronomy, and Wright Center for Photovoltaics Innovation and Commercialization, University of Toledo, Toledo, OH, USA

    Xiaoming Wang & Yanfa Yan

  8. School of Engineering, Brown University, Providence, RI, USA

    Zhenghong Dai & Nitin P. Padture

Authors
  1. Xiaopeng Zheng
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Contributions

X.Z. and J.M.L. conceived the idea and designed the experiments. J.M.L. and Z.Z. supervised the project. X.Z. and Z.L. fabricated the devices and conducted the characterizations. Y.Z., D.G. and C.Z. participated in device fabrication. M.C., J.B.P., D.K., R.A.S., D.M. and B.M.W. performed optical spectroscopy and analysis. T.L. and H.P. carried out XPS and UPS measurements. C.X. conducted and analysed the KPFM and C-AFM measurements. S.P.H. performed TOF-SIMS measurements. Z.L., Z.D. and N.P.P. contributed to the device MPP stability test. X.W. and Y.Y. performed and interpreted the DFT calculations. A.M., A.R.K., N.P.P., K.R.G., Y.Y., M.K.N. and M.D.M. contributed to the analysis and provided advice. X.Z. and J.M.L. wrote the initial draft and all authors contributed to the final paper.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Zonglong Zhu or Joseph M. Luther.

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Competing interests

X.Z. and J.M.L. are inventors on a pending provisional patent (US application no. 63/363,327, filed on 21 April 2022 by Alliance for Sustainable Energy) related to the one-step solution method co-deposition of hole-selective contact and absorber for perovskite solar cells as discussed in this manuscript. M.D.M. is an advisor to Swift Solar. All other authors declare no competing interests.

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Supplementary Figs. 1–26, Tables 1–4 and references.

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Supplementary Data 1

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Supplementary Data 2

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Zheng, X., Li, Z., Zhang, Y. et al. Co-deposition of hole-selective contact and absorber for improving the processability of perovskite solar cells. Nat Energy 8, 462–472 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41560-023-01227-6

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