Enhancing Performance of Large‐Area Organic Solar Cells with Thick Film via Ternary Strategy

Abstract

Large-scale fabrication of organic solar cells requires an active layer with high thickness tolerability and the use of environment-friendly solvents. Thick films with high-performance can be achieved via a ternary strategy studied herein. The ternary system consists of one polymer donor, one small molecule donor, and one fullerene acceptor. The small molecule enhances the crystallinity and face-on orientation of the active layer, leading to improved thickness tolerability compared with that of a polymer-fullerene binary system. An active layer with 270 nm thickness exhibits an average power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 10.78%, while the PCE is less than 8% with such thick film for binary system. Furthermore, large-area devices are successfully fabricated using polyethylene terephthalate (PET)/Silver gride or indium tin oxide (ITO)-based transparent flexible substrates. The product shows a high PCE of 8.28% with an area of 1.25 cm for a single cell and 5.18% for a 20 cm module. This study demonstrates that ternary organic solar cells exhibit great potential for large-scale fabrication and future applications.

Printed Nonfullerene Organic Solar Cells with the Highest Efficiency of 9.5%

“…The big increase of 100 mV in V oc has not been reported in NF OSCs with a tiny amount of DIO addition. [23][24][25][29][30][31][32] To understand the function of DIO in PTB7-Th:ITIC BHJ formed by doctor-blading, we utilize a transient monitoring technique to track the drying processes of the three NF blend films (see Figure S5 in the Supporting Information). The optimal performance of doctor-bladed OSC is superior to the controlled spin-coating one with a PCE of 9.31%, indicating the effectiveness of the doctor-blading technique in production of NF OSCs.…”

Evaporation‐Free Nonfullerene Flexible Organic Solar Cell Modules Manufactured by An All‐Solution Process

“…[26,39] However, the flexible OSC modules based solution-processed top electrode have reported various challenging attempts in large-area system. [26,39] However, the flexible OSC modules based solution-processed top electrode have reported various challenging attempts in large-area system.…”

“…In these cases, the V OC drop occurs due to interfacial interaction, wettability and energy level mismatch with photoactive layer and hole transport layers (HTLs) (particularly HTL Solar, a kind of modified-poly(2,3-dihydrothieno-1,4-dioxin):poly(styrene sulfonate), PEDOT:PSS). [25,26,32,33] During this process, the conductive silver (Ag) paste commonly used is usually treated by thermal and ultraviolet (UV) curing to fabricate electrodes. [13,54] However, only a few studies have investigated solution-processed devices that contain an NFAsbased BHJ layer, and the incorporation of modified-buffer layer and dual buffer layer that allow energy level matching is also necessary.…”

“…[1][2][3][4][5][6] It is possible to design high-performance devices by designing photoactive materials that constitute a bulk heterojunction (BHJ), [7][8][9] device engineering, [10][11][12][13] and a combination of these. [4,[16][17][18][19][20] Recently, different methods such as spin coating, [21][22][23] slotdie coating, [24][25][26] and blade coating, [27,28] are being attempted to develop large-area modules with laboratory-to-industrial applications. [4,[16][17][18][19][20] Recently, different methods such as spin coating, [21][22][23] slotdie coating, [24][25][26] and blade coating, [27,28] are being attempted to develop large-area modules with laboratory-to-industrial applications.…”

“…Therefore, it is the most appropriate coating method to use to produce devices and modules with large areas. [3,25,26,37] The large-area flexible OSC modules have been reported their efficiencies with various materials and coating methods. Their flexible OSC modules with power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) of 2-3% demonstrated an energy payback time (EPBT) of 2.02-1.35 years.…”