Emerging Earth-Abundant Solar Absorbers

Design of New Ternary Nitrides for Photovoltaic Applications via High-Throughput Calculations

“…The analysis of band alignments is necessary for heterojunction design and their application in high efficiency photovoltaic materials. − Considering that the poor junctions have been suggested as a reason for the low photoelectric conversion efficiency (PCE) in existing ZnSnN 2 cells, searching the better junction-forming partners seems particularly necessary to fully realize the potential of ZnSnN 2 absorbers . We have obtained the ionization potential (IP) and electron affinity (EA) of Fd -3 m -MgTiN 2 , Pmmn -CaTiN 2 , Pmmn -SrTiN 2 , Pna 2 1 -MgSnN 2 , Pna 2 1 -ZnSnN 2 , Pmc 2 1 -ZnSnN 2 , and P -4 m 2-ZnSnN 2 by calculating their band alignments.…”

“…80−84 Considering that the poor junctions have been suggested as a reason for the low photoelectric conversion efficiency (PCE) in existing ZnSnN 2 cells, searching the better junction-forming partners seems particularly necessary to fully realize the potential of ZnSnN 2 absorbers. 85 We have obtained the ionization potential (IP) and electron affinity (EA) of Fd-3m-MgTiN 2 , Pmmn-CaTiN 2 , Pmmn-SrTiN 2 , Pna2 1 -MgSnN 2 , Pna2 1 -ZnSnN 2 , Pmc2 1 -ZnSnN 2 , and P-4m2-ZnSnN 2 by calculating their band alignments. We first obtained slabs of these seven phases cleaved along the interplane direction of the structures and calculated the potentials at GGA level; the analysis of the potentials and the band alignment was performed using the Macro Density package.…”

Recent advances in dopant-free organic hole-transporting materials for efficient, stable and low-cost perovskite solar cells

“…Solar energy plays an important role in combating climate change as an alternative to fossil fuels. [1][2][3] Solar cells are one of the most important technologies in solar energy. As one of the third generation solar cells, perovskite solar cells (PSCs) have attracted considerable attention for industrial application because of their excellent power conversion efficiency (PCE) and low-cost fabrication.…”

“…The general chemical structure of perovskite materials can be represented as ABX 3 , where A is a monovalent cation such as CH 3 NH 3 + (MA + ), (NH 2 ) 2 CH + (FA + ) or Cs + , B is a divalent cation such as Pb 2+ or Sn 2+ , and X is a monovalent anion such as Cl À , Br À or I À , as illustrated in Fig. 1(a).…”

Electronic structure, defect properties, and optimization of the band gap of the earth-abundant and low-toxicity photovoltaic absorber Cu3SbS4

“…Therefore, searching for an alternative absorber composed of earth-abundant and low-toxicity elements has attracted much attention recently. 5 After the cation substitution through two In atoms to one Zn and one Sn in the two units of chalcopyrite CuIn(S,Se) 2 , the resulting kesterite compound Cu 2 ZnSn(S,Se) 4 avoids the expensive In element. In addition, it maintains the direct-gap band structure with small carrier effective masses, which is suitable for thin-film solar cells, 6,7 and the PCE of devices has reached 13%.…”