Toward Industrial-Scale Production of Perovskite Solar Cells: Screen Printing, Slot-Die Coating, and Emerging Techniques

Abstract

Perovskite solar cells (PSCs) have attracted intensive attention of the researchers and industry due to their high efficiency, low material cost, and simple solution-based fabrication process. Along with the development of device configurations, materials, and fabrication techniques, the efficiency has rapidly increased from the initial 3.8 to recent 22.7%. However, fundamental studies on PSCs are usually yielded through lab-scale procedures and carried out on small-area (≤1 cm) devices. Recently, various deposition methods, such as screen printing, slot-die coating, soft-cover coating, spraying coating, etc., have been developed to enlarge the device area from the millimeters to hundreds of centimeters scale. Herein, we discuss the advances of up-scaling of PSCs and outline the fabrication methods from lab-scale to industrial-scale. Screen printing and slot-die coating have been regarded as the most promising methods toward the mass production of PSCs, and more emerging techniques are also anticipated in this enterprise.

All Green Solvents for Fabrication of CsPbBr3 Films for Efficient Solar Cells Guided by the Hansen Solubility Theory

“…Due to their rapid improvement in efficiency of perovskite solar cells (PSCs), great efforts have been shifted from laboratory‐scale investigation to industry large‐scale production for the PSCs . Toxicity issues, including intrinsic lead toxicity in the perovskite and inductive toxic organic solvents used for fabricating the perovskite films, are two non‐negligible obstacles for the commercialization of PSCs .…”

To Be Higher and Stronger—Metal Oxide Electron Transport Materials for Perovskite Solar Cells

“…Solution process is the most widely used method for depositing MO layers via either thermolysis of metal salt precursors or synthesis of MO nanocrystals and nanocolloidals, as shown in Figure a . For the thermolysis method, metal salts or their hydrates were first dissolved in suitable solvents and then deposited on the substrate by many methods, such as spin‐coating and spray‐coating.…”

“…For the deposition of MO nanocrystals or nanoparticles, spin‐coating, screen printing, and slot‐die coating have been widely used. Screen printing is a conventional film deposition method to prepare mesoporous MO ETLs, for which a mesh is employed to transfer paste onto the flat substrate . Slot‐die coating is utilized to deposit homogeneous wet films without any contact, especially favorable for flexible substrates .…”

Copper nanomaterials and assemblies for soft electronics

“…When a patterned screen is used as a mask in the doctor blading process, this process is evolved into screen printing, which allows the ink to penetrate through the open windows of the screen onto the target substrate [13,[109][110][111][112]. The screens are made from photo-lithographically patterned fabrics or etched stainless steels or even silicon wafers [81,113].…”

“…The screen can be away from the substrate below for a controlled distance to allow a clean transfer of the inks. The inks usually have a high viscosity to prevent the leakages across the porous openings [81,112]. Fig.…”