Issue 24, 2022

Enabling water-free PEDOT as hole selective layer in lead-free tin perovskite solar cells

Abstract

Metal halide perovskites are set to revolutionise photovoltaic energy harvesting owing to an unmatched combination of high efficiency and low fabrication costs. However, to improve the sustainability of this technology, replacing lead with less toxic tin is highly desired. Tin halide perovskites are approaching 15% in power conversion efficiency (PCE), mainly employing PEDOT:PSS as a hole-selective layer. Unfortunately, PEDOT:PSS is processed from an aqueous solution, which is hardly compatible with the strict anoxic requirements for processing tin halide perovskites due to tin's instability to oxidation. Here, we present a water-free PEDOT formulation for developing tin-based lead-free perovskite solar cells. We show that the main difference between the PCE of devices made from aqueous and water-free PEDOT is due to the marked hydrophobicity of the latter, which complicates the perovskite deposition. By modifying the surface of water-free PEDOT with a thin Al2O3 interlayer, we could achieve good perovskite morphology that enabled perovskite solar cells with a PCE of 7.5%.

Graphical abstract: Enabling water-free PEDOT as hole selective layer in lead-free tin perovskite solar cells

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
19 Jul 2022
Accepted
11 Oct 2022
First published
11 Nov 2022
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY-NC license

Mater. Adv., 2022,3, 9083-9089

Enabling water-free PEDOT as hole selective layer in lead-free tin perovskite solar cells

D. Di Girolamo, E. Aktas, C. Ponti, J. Pascual, G. Li, M. Li, G. Nasti, F. Alharthi, F. Mura and A. Abate, Mater. Adv., 2022, 3, 9083 DOI: 10.1039/D2MA00834C

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