Dye‐sensitized solar cells as promising candidates for underwater photovoltaic applications

Abstract

Harvesting solar energy using photovoltaic (PV) cells is the simplest, efficient, and reliable approach to power marine electronics. Installing PV above or under water provides cooling and cleaning to sustain the power conversion efficiency. Previous work on commercially available silicon-based PV quantified the performance of PV with different submerged environments and showed promising results in harvesting available underwater solar energy. Subsequent, theoretical studies point to enormous potential of using wide-band-gap PV in underwater conditions. With this motivation, herein for the first time, a dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) employing wide-bandgap ruthenium sensitizers (1.8 eV) have been tested under submerged conditions. The DSSCs were characterized under submerged conditions up to 20 cm. Four replicates provided data detailing DSSCs potential for underwater PV applications when compared with the previously collected data for monocrystalline, polycrystalline, and amorphous silicon PV. Although the light intensity under water decreases with an increase in depths, the rate of decrease in power output for DSSCs was only 40.68%,

Understanding Mass Transport in Copper Electrolyte-Based Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells

“…Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs) invented in 1991 by O’Regan and Grätzel garnered recognition during their first two decades for their aesthetics, low cost, and ease of fabrication. − In recent times, DSCs regained more attention accounting for its superior performance under lower illumination intensities and indoor/ambient light conditions. − Hagfeldt and co-workers recently achieved a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 34.5% under standard 1000 lx illumination using [Cu­(tmby) 2 ] 2+/1+ (where tmby is bis­(4,4′,6,6′-tetramethyl-2,2′-bipyridine)) electrolyte along with cosensitized XY1b and MS5 dyes . Even though the conventional iodide/triiodide mediator possesses advantages of reduced recombination rates and faster diffusion of ions, factors such as significant overpotential loss in dye regeneration, high reactivity with metal contacts, and limited flexibility toward the tuning of redox potential demand new electrolytes.…”

Exfoliated 2D Antimonene‐Based Structures for Light‐Harvesting Photoactive Layer of Highly Stable Solar Cells

“…The significant benefits of using PV devices underwater include addressing land use restrictions, protecting cells from thermal degradation and others. [43,44] The key requirement for underwater solar cells is the excellent device stability and its operation underwater, for which our new type of Sb 2 S 3 solar cells show a great promise.…”

Dye‐Sensitized Solar Cells with Efficiency over 36% under Ambient Light Achieved by Cosensitized Tandem Structure

“…[11,12] To obtain high performance from DSSCs working under one-sun and room light conditions, various electrolytes, electrodes, and dyes have been prepared and utilized. [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43] The optimal conditions are also altered for DSSCs to perform efficiently under different light conditions. [26][27][28][29][30][31][32] Among the various steps in DSSCs fabrication, the dye selection and architecture of the titanium dioxide (TiO 2 ) layers are considered important steps that need to be carefully carried out before fabricating DSSCs because the properties of the dyes, TiO 2 particle size, and the number of TiO 2 layers have a major impact on the light-harvesting ability of the photoelectrode, significantly affecting the incident photon-to-current conversion efficiency (IPCE), current density ( J sc ), and recombination of the electrons.…”

“…[ 11,12 ] To obtain high performance from DSSCs working under one‐sun and room light conditions, various electrolytes, electrodes, and dyes have been prepared and utilized. [ 13–24,25–43 ] The optimal conditions are also altered for DSSCs to perform efficiently under different light conditions. [ 26–32 ]…”