Monolithic all-solid-state dye-sensitized solar cells

Abstract

As a low-cost photovoltaic technology, dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC) has attracted widespread attention in the past decade. During its development to commercial application, decreasing the production cost and increasing the device stability take the most importance. Compared with conventional sandwich structure liquid-state DSSCs, monolithic all-solid-state mesoscopic solar cells based on mesoscopic carbon counter electrodes and solid-state electrolytes present much lower production cost and provide a prospect of long-term stability. This review presents the recent progress of materials and achievement for all-solid-state DSSCs. In particular, representative examples are highlighted with the results of our monolithic all-solid-state mesoscopic solar cell devices and modules.

Keywords

photovoltaic (PV) technology / monolithic / dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) / all-solid-state / mesoscopic / carbon counter electrode

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the financial support by the National High Technology Research and Development Program of China (863 Program, No. SS2013AA50303), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 61106056) and Scientific Research Foundation for Returned Scholars, Ministry of Education of China.

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2014 Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg