Flash infrared annealing as a cost-effective and low environmental impact processing method for planar perovskite solar cells

Sánchez, Sandy; Vallés‐Pelarda, Marta; Alberola-Borràs, Jaume-Adrià; Vidal, Rosario; Jerónimo-Rendón, José J.; Saliba, Michael; Boix, Pablo P.; Mora‐Seró, Iván

doi:10.1016/j.mattod.2019.04.021

Cited by 71 publications

(66 citation statements)

References 58 publications

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“…[ 22,23 ] However, reports show that FTO remains stable at 800–1000 °C for short heating times (≈10 1 –10 3 s). [ 20,24,25 ] Second, there is no Cu x Bi 2− x O 4 solid solution (CuBi 2 O 4 is a line compound), resulting in the segregation of either CuO or Bi 2 O 3 when Bi:Cu stoichiometry ≠ 2. Note that both CuO and Bi 2 O 3 are photo‐electrochemically active materials, Figure S2 (Supporting Information).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pure CuBi₂O₄ Photoelectrodes with Increased Stability by Rapid Thermal Processing of Bi₂O₃/CuO Grown by Pulsed Laser Deposition

Gottesman

Song

Levine

et al. 2020

Adv Funct Materials

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A new method for enhancing the charge separation and photo-electrochemical stability of CuBi 2 O 4 photoelectrodes by sequentially depositing Bi 2 O 3 and CuO layers on fluorine-doped tin oxide substrates with pulsed laser deposition (PLD), followed by rapid thermal processing (RTP), resulting in phasepure, highly crystalline films after 10 min at 650 °C, is reported. Conventional furnace annealing of similar films for 72 h at 500 °C do not result in phasepure CuBi 2 O 4 . The combined PLD and RTP approach allow excellent control of the Bi:Cu stoichiometry and results in photoelectrodes with superior electronic properties compared to photoelectrodes fabricated through spray pyrolysis. The low photocurrents of the CuBi 2 O 4 photocathodes fabricated through PLD/RTP in this study are primarily attributed to their low specific surface area, lack of CuO impurities, and limited, slow charge transport in the undoped films. Bare (without protection layers) CuBi 2 O 4 photoelectrodes made with PLD/RTP shows a photocurrent decrease of only 26% after 5 h, which represents the highest stability reported to date for this material. The PLD/RTP fabrication approach offers new possibilities of fabricating complex metal oxides photoelectrodes with a high degree of crystallinity and good electronic properties at higher temperatures than the thermal stability of glass-based transparent conductive substrates would allow.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pure CuBi₂O₄ Photoelectrodes with Increased Stability by Rapid Thermal Processing of Bi₂O₃/CuO Grown by Pulsed Laser Deposition

Gottesman

Song

Levine

et al. 2020

Adv Funct Materials

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“…To control the crystallization, rapid thermal annealing techniques have been used widely including perovskite film fabrication. [ 28,176–178 ] For perovskite film postannealing treatment, intense radiation of near IR [ 28,179,180 ] or microwave [ 181 ] or UV–vis [ 182 ] or very high temperature [ 183 ] (> 200 °C) has been used for a very short time (few ms to few min) to induce rapid and better quality perovskite film. In addition, rapid thermal annealing techniques are cost‐effective, environmentally friendly, and quite useful for large‐area perovskite film fabrication.…”

Section: Alternatives To Antisolventsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Antisolvents in Perovskite Solar Cells: Importance, Issues, and Alternatives

Ghosh

Mishra

Singh

2020

Adv Materials Inter

119

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technologies based on crystalline silicon, cadmium telluride (CdTe), copper indium gallium selenide (CIGS), etc. [15,16] Tremendous efforts are being given to commercialization of PSCs through improving the device efficiency, stability, and ability to fabricate large-area perovskite films. Though the current efficiency of PSCs is comparable to other matured solar cell technologies, this technology is behind those in terms of stability and large-area fabrication ability. Hopefully, various technologies have come out as potential largearea film fabrication methods, like blade coating, spray coating, slot-die coating, roll printing, etc. [17-20] Furthermore, stability can be improved mostly by encapsulation technologies and using additives in precursor solutions, but still not up to the mark for commercial use, which leaves a huge space for further research. [15,21-24] At the beginning of the perovskite solar cell era, uniform and pinhole-free perovskite film formation was a challenge. It is notable that, pinholes lead to a decrease in shunt resistance and nonuniformity leads to an increase in series resistance, which ultimately produce poor efficiency and stability of the device. Gradually, various technologies had been developed to improve the overall film quality, i.e., to obtain uniform and fully covered films. Among those technologies, the use of antisolvents during the perovskite film formation became very successful to obtain uniform and pinhole-free film, which dramatically increased the efficiency of the devices (also improved the stability to some extent). Antisolvents induce rapid and dense nucleation of perovskite that lead to uniform and pinhole free films. [25] Other effective alternative technologies are additive engineering, [26] hot casting, [27] rapid thermal annealing, [28] and solvent annealing. [29,30] In additive engineering, additives are used generally to slow down the crystallization process of perovskite or defect passivation to improve the crystallinity and optoelectronic properties of the perovskite film. In hot casting, hot precursor solution is coated on a hot substrate for better crystallization that improves the perovskite film quality. In rapid thermal annealing, a high intensity radiation is applied for post-annealing of perovskite film. In solvent annealing, a solvent vapor is allowed to condense on the surface, voids, and grain boundaries of the film, in which the perovskite dissolve and recrystallize to reduce the grain boundaries and pinholes. Interestingly, the best efficiency solar cells are mostly fabricated by using antisolvents. Therefore, a review article on the use of Organic-inorganic metal halide perovskite solar cells are emerging as potential solar energy harvesting tools and can be a tough competitor to already matured solar cell technologies. The success of perovskite solar cells is attributed to superior optoelectronic properties of perovskites, feasible synthesis process, and low fabrication cost. Though perovskite solar cells confront perovskite film quality rela...

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“…Moreover, compared with the traditional thermal annealing, the energy consumption of laser treatment is much less. [ 14 ] In addition, the controlled laser‐assisted manufacture of perovskite films can be realized by adjusting the laser spot size and energy intensity, to optimize the grain size and crystalline orientation to reduce the carrier energy loss in transmission. [ 15–17 ] High pulse energy is a significant feature of pulsed laser processing, which has advantages over continuous laser in reducing residual stress in perovskite to improve its stability, grain boundary and interface passivation to improve carrier transport.…”

Section: Figurementioning

confidence: 99%

Quantum Dot Enabled Perovskite Thin Film with Enhanced Crystallization, Stability, and Carrier Diffusion via Pulsed Laser Nanoengineering

Song

Yang

Liu

et al. 2020

Adv Materials Inter

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transport dynamics, which is the key for high-performance perovskite devices. At present, precursor solution additive as a convenient and effective method has been widely used in the structural optimization of perovskite films, [8] such as doping in the perovskite lattice to form bonds, [9] and additives to form hydrogen bonds with perovskites. [10] Quantum dots (QDs) are often doped in perovskite grain boundaries to reduce the boundary barrier for promoting the transport of photogenic carriers. [11] In addition, additives to prevent water/oxygen penetration by forming strong chemical bonds at the interface are important way to improve the stability of perovskite films. [12] Although precursor solution additive method provides an excellent material based for the structural optimization, the current postprocessing methods are limited to fabricate crystalline perovskite films to control their structure and properties, due to the challenges in manipulate the heating/cooling rate, residual stress, and microstructure, such as grain size, intragrain defects, and grain boundary defects. Laser has been widely used in semiconductor processing because of its advantages of monochromatism, coherence, directionality, high speed processing, scalability, wide range control of energy density, and wavelength. The laser-assisted processing technology was developed for rapid processing of perovskite, [13] which can facilitate the postprocessing of perovskite devices with high speed. Moreover, compared with the traditional thermal annealing, the energy consumption of laser treatment is much less. [14] In addition, The temperature control at the material interface, such as grain boundaries, is critical for defect density, and phases, which are important for high-performance perovskite-based optoelectronic devices. However, it is challenging to fine-tune the microstructures in perovskite films with well-controlled grain structure, interface defects, porosity, phase structure, and strains, simultaneously. Here, pulsed laser technology is combined with carbon quantum dots (CQDs) into perovskite absorbers with pore-free, less defect, high crystallinity, enhanced absorption, low stress, and phase-stabilized microstructures. Due to laser-CQD interaction-induced grain boundary microstructure changes, perovskite films can be fabricated with much larger grains (>10 times) than those after thermal annealing. As CQDs are embedded to passivate grain, this leads to reduced grain boundary barrier at the interface, which significantly improve the carrier transportation in perovskite films. The shift of perovskite band to vacuum energy level leads to remarkable improvement of carrier extraction efficiency and lifetime, leading to much higher mobility of photogenerated carriers and diffusion length (>1 μm). The laser-induced thermomechanical momentum significantly enhances crystal interface with hydrophobic perovskite film, resulting in much less residual tensile stress by 20 times and excellent stability. Pulsed-laser-assisted QD additive engineerin...

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Flash infrared annealing as a cost-effective and low environmental impact processing method for planar perovskite solar cells

Cited by 71 publications

References 58 publications

Pure CuBi₂O₄ Photoelectrodes with Increased Stability by Rapid Thermal Processing of Bi₂O₃/CuO Grown by Pulsed Laser Deposition

Pure CuBi₂O₄ Photoelectrodes with Increased Stability by Rapid Thermal Processing of Bi₂O₃/CuO Grown by Pulsed Laser Deposition

Antisolvents in Perovskite Solar Cells: Importance, Issues, and Alternatives

Quantum Dot Enabled Perovskite Thin Film with Enhanced Crystallization, Stability, and Carrier Diffusion via Pulsed Laser Nanoengineering

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Flash infrared annealing as a cost-effective and low environmental impact processing method for planar perovskite solar cells

Cited by 71 publications

References 58 publications

Pure CuBi2O4 Photoelectrodes with Increased Stability by Rapid Thermal Processing of Bi2O3/CuO Grown by Pulsed Laser Deposition

Pure CuBi2O4 Photoelectrodes with Increased Stability by Rapid Thermal Processing of Bi2O3/CuO Grown by Pulsed Laser Deposition

Antisolvents in Perovskite Solar Cells: Importance, Issues, and Alternatives

Quantum Dot Enabled Perovskite Thin Film with Enhanced Crystallization, Stability, and Carrier Diffusion via Pulsed Laser Nanoengineering

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Product

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Pure CuBi₂O₄ Photoelectrodes with Increased Stability by Rapid Thermal Processing of Bi₂O₃/CuO Grown by Pulsed Laser Deposition

Pure CuBi₂O₄ Photoelectrodes with Increased Stability by Rapid Thermal Processing of Bi₂O₃/CuO Grown by Pulsed Laser Deposition