CH₃NH₃PbI₃-Based Planar Solar Cells with Magnetron-Sputtered Nickel Oxide

Abstract

Herein we report an investigation of a CH3NH3PbI3 planar solar cell, showing significant power conversion efficiency (PCE) improvement from 4.88% to 6.13% by introducing a homogeneous and uniform NiO blocking interlayer fabricated with the reactive magnetron sputtering method. The sputtered NiO layer exhibits enhanced crystallization, high transmittance, and uniform surface morphology as well as a preferred in-plane orientation of the (200) plane. The PCE of the sputtered-NiO-based perovskite p-i-n planar solar cell can be further promoted to 9.83% when a homogeneous and dense perovskite layer is formed with solvent-engineering technology, showing an impressive open circuit voltage of 1.10 V. This is about 33% higher than that of devices using the conventional spray pyrolysis of NiO onto a transparent conducting glass. These results highlight the importance of a morphology- and crystallization-compatible interlayer toward a high-performance inverted perovskite planar solar cell.

Overcoming the Limitations of Sputtered Nickel Oxide for High‐Efficiency and Large‐Area Perovskite Solar Cells

“…The NiO x ‐based PSCs exhibit a relatively low PCE of 14.7%, along with a V oc of 1041 mV, a FF of 0.7, and a J sc of 20.3 mA cm −2 . Despite this, it is worthwhile noting that our sputtered NiO x ‐based solar cells still perform better than the previously reported results, the highest efficiency of which is only 11.6% 31, 32. We note that the previous results are based on the NiO x HTL sputtered using a high oxygen partial pressure.…”

Effect of Carrier Transport in NiO on the Photovoltaic Properties of Lead Iodide Perovskite Solar Cells

“…5. 3,8,21 Based on the measurements taken by the surface analyzer, the work function of the sputtered NiO x was estimated to be ca. 5.5 eV.…”

“…15 Recently, several hole transport materials (HTM) have also been introduced into the perovskite solar cells in place of PEDOT:PSS to obtain probable device application or efficient devices. [19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32] The typical requirements for HTMs of perovskite solar cells are as follows.…”

“…NiO x has been introduced as the HTM and electron blocking layer for perovskite solar cells to improve the stability of the device by place from organic HTM to inorganic HTM. [19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29] The valence band edge (E VB ) of NiO x is also energetically matched with that of perovskite. 19,22,25,26,33 The transmittance of NiO x is very high in the visible region because the band gap of NiO is over 3.0 eV.…”

Improved efficiency of NiOx-based p-i-n perovskite solar cells by using PTEG-1 as electron transport layer

“…15,16 PCBM (phenyl-C 61 -butyric acid methyl ester) is commonly used as the electron transport layer in the p-i-n structure, but this material is often combined with other layers, such as bathocuproine (BCP), to block holes and improve the power conversion efficiency. 15,17,18 Incorporating additional layers into the solar cell's device structure leads to increased complexity in processing, and therefore it is desirable to replace the electron transport layer to simplify the overall device structure. Recently, Yin et al showed NiO x -based solar cells with only PCBM as the electron transport layer (ETL), reaching a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 15.7%.…”