High-performance dye-sensitized solar cells having nonvolatile electrolytes are desired. We found that photovoltaic performance increased when water was added into nonvolatile organic molten salts in the presence of both LiI and tert-butylpyridine. We achieved 4.2% energy-conversion efficiency for the 1 cm2 cell containing the above electrolyte (AM1.5, 100 mW/cm2) without other volatile organic solvents.
Anomalous phenomena on gel electrolytes for quasi-dye sensitized solar cells are reported. Performances for gel electrolytes usually decrease with an increase in the amount of gelators. When tetra(bromomethyl)benzene providing three dimensional ionomer gel electrolytes is used, photocurrents increase with an increase in the amount of the gelator. This may be explained partially by decrease in interfacial resistances between gel electrolytes and electrodes.
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