Development of Greener and Stable Inkjet‐Printable Perovskite Precursor Inks for All‐Printed Annealing‐Free Perovskite Solar Mini‐Modules Manufacturing

Abstract

Inkjet‐printing is considered an emerging manufacturing process for developing perovskite solar cells (PSCs) with low material wastes and high production throughput. Up‐to‐now, all case studies on inkjet‐printed PSCs are based on the exploitation of toxic solvents and/or high‐molarity perovskite precursor inks that are known to enable the development of high‐efficiency photovoltaics (PVs). The present study provides a new insight for developing lower‐toxicity, high performance and stable (for more than 2 months) inkjet‐printable perovskite precursor inks for fully ambient air processed PSCs. Using an ink composed of a green low vapor pressure noncoordinating solvent and only 0.8 m of perovskite precursors, the feasibility of fabricating high‐quality and with minimum coffee‐ring defects, annealing‐free perovskite absorbent layers under ambient atmosphere is demonstrated. Noteworthily, the PSCs fabricated using the industry‐compatible carbon‐based hole transport material free architecture and the proposed ink present an efficiency >13% that is considered on the performance records for the under‐consideration PV architecture employing an inkjet‐printed active layer. Outstanding is also found the stability of the devices under the conditions determined by the ISOS‐D‐1 protocol (T95 = 1000 h). Finally, the perspective of upscaling PSCs to the mini‐module level (100 cm2 aperture area) is demonstrated, with the upscaling losses to be as low as 8.3%rel dec−1 per upscaled active area.

Annual research review of perovskite solar cells in 2023

“…The main processing advantages of this method are that it can scale from small-area lab cells to large-area industrial production, with low cost and less material consumption [237]. Chalkias et al introduced a solution system comprising gamma-valerolactone (GVL), a green solvent, to replace the toxic solvent, DMF [254]. The 0.8 M GVL-based PVK precursor ink exhibited high performance and stability and could be used for high-quality PVK film preparation even after storing for 2 months at room temperature in the dark.…”

Low-Cost Room-Temperature Perovskite Solar Cells Suitable for Continuous Production

“…This constraint hinders the advancement of RT-PSCs utilizing traditional solvents. To tackle this challenge, researchers have developed novel solvents, such as acetonitrile (ACN), 1,2-dimethoxyethane (DME), tetrahydrofuran (THF), mixtures of methylamine in ethanol (ME) in combination with a secondary solvent (ACN, or THF), 2-methoxyethanol (2-ME), and gamma-valerolactone (GVL), which are better suited for the fabrication of RT-PSCs [28,[56][57][58][59][60][61][62]. These solvents possess properties such as low boiling points, volatility, and the absence of stable intermediate phases.…”

Manipulation of Cs0.1FA0.9PbI3 crystallization behavior towards efficient carbon-based printable mesoscopic perovskite solar cells

“…Under strict controlled conditions, a solar cell module based on the printable mesoscopic structure with an area of 10 × 10 cm 2 demonstrated exceptional stability for over 10 000 h without degradation. 13 However, although many strategies have been employed to improve the performance of printable MPSCs, including additives, 14–16 components 17 and solvent engineering, 18,19 the highest PCE reported so far is 19.35%, 20 and there is still room for further improvement to fully exploit their application potential. The main reason is that the thickness of m-TiO 2 /m-ZrO 2 /carbon for printable MPSCs exceeds 15 μm and the arrangement of mesopores is complicated.…”