Highly efficient and stable organic solar cell modules processed by blade coating with 5.6% module efficiency and active area of 216 cm²

Abstract

In this study, an efficient and stable large‐area blade‐coated organic solar cell (OSC) module with an active area of 216 cm2 (16 elementary cells connected in series) is demonstrated by combining appropriate thermal annealing treatment with the use of 4,4′‐(((methyl(4‐sulphonatobutyl)ammonio)bis(propane‐3,1‐diyl))bis(dimethyl‐ammoniumdiyl))bis‐(butane‐1‐sulfonate) (MSAPBS) as the cathode interfacial layer. For the opaque device using poly[4,8‐bis(5‐(2‐ethylhexyl)thiophen‐2‐yl)benzo[1,2‐b;4,5‐b′]dithiophene‐2,6‐diyl‐alt‐(4‐(2‐ethylhexyl)‐3‐fluorothieno[3,4‐b]thiophene‐)‐2‐carboxylate‐2‐6‐diyl)] (PBDTTT‐EFT (PTB7‐Th)):[6,6]‐phenyl C71‐butyric acid methyl ester (PC71BM) blend film as the active layer, the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 5.6% is achieved under AM 1.5G solar light illumination. Very encouragingly, our strategy can be applicable for semitransparent OSCs, and a remarkable PCE up to 4.5% is observed. To the best of our knowledge, the PCE of 5.6% for opaque device and 4.5% for semitransparent device represent the highest PCE ever reported for OSCs with the active area exceeding 100 cm2. The devices also show an impressive stability under outdoor environment, where the efficiency decay is less than 30% for 60 days. Our findings can pave the way toward the development of organic solar cell modules with high performance and long‐term stability.

Nonfullerene Polymer Solar Cell with Large Active Area of 216 cm2 and High Power Conversion Efficiency of 7.7%

“…More details on the effect of the cell width design has been reported before . The large‐area device design has also been reported before . The top view and the side view of the schematic diagrams for the large‐area device design are shown in Figure d,e.…”

“…Furthermore, the suitable level of phase separation between the donor and acceptor is critical to the exciton dissociation and the overall PCE. A PSC with fullerene acceptor has been shown to keep 70% of the small‐area devices efficiency as the area is extended from 0.04 cm 2 to over 50 cm 2 . However, there is a fundamental difference in the molecular packing for the two types of acceptor as the fused‐ring in the nonfullerene acceptor may cause a higher tendency of packing in the drying process.…”

“…In this work, we study a large‐area nonfullerene PSC by the blade coating method, which has been proved successful for nonfullerene cases. By careful control of the coating conditions on the glass substrate of 20 cm × 30 cm (A4 size), we achieve a remarkable PCE of 7.69% for an active area of 216 cm 2 .…”

“…To our knowledge, this represents the highest reported efficiency for PSCs with the active area more than 10 cm 2 as shown in Figure c. We organize the progress for fullerene‐based PSCs (active area larger than 10 cm 2 ), nonfullerene‐based PSCs (active area larger than 1 cm 2 ), and ternary PSCs (active area larger than 1 cm 2 ) in Table . A ternary blend is used for the active layer, including a polymer donor poly[(2,6‐(4,8‐bis(5‐(2‐ethylhexyl)thiophen‐2‐yl)benzo[1,2‐b:4,5‐b’]dithiophene))‐co‐(1,3‐di(5‐thiophene‐2‐yl)‐5,7‐bis(2‐ethylhexyl)benzo[1,2‐c:4,5‐c’]dithiophene‐4,8‐dione)] (PBDB‐T), a nonfullerene acceptor 3,9‐bis(2‐methylene‐(3‐(1,1‐dicyanomethylene)‐indanone))‐5,5,11,11‐tetrakis(4‐hexylphenyl)‐dithieno[2,3‐d:2’,3’‐d’]‐s‐indaceno[1,2‐b:5,6‐b’] dithiophene) (ITIC), and the fullerene acceptor PC 71 BM.…”

Water Compatible Direct (Hetero)arylation Polymerization of PPDT2FBT: A Pathway Towards Large‐Scale Production of Organic Solar Cells

“…[1][2][3][4] However, some issues still need to be addressed before scaling-up the production of OSCs, including material cost, the coatability of these materials, and the stability of the produced devices. Although many reports have demonstrated large scale and eco-friendly solvent processing, [5][6][7][8][9][10][11] low cost materials, [12][13][14] and stable OSC devices, [15][16][17][18][19] today's OSCs do not yet meet the ensemble of these criteria. When considering the aforementioned objectives, the so-called ''10-10 challenge'', consisting of obtaining PCEs of 10% with a 10 year stability [20] has not been achieved for low-cost OSC systems.…”