Indium-doped tin oxide free electrochromic devices are prepared by coating electrochromic polymers onto polyethylene terephthalate substrates encompassing two different silver grids as electrodes. One design comprises a fl exoprinted highly conductive silver grid electrode, yielding electrochromic devices with a response time of 2 s for an optical contrast of 27%. The other design utilizes an embedded silver grid electrode whereupon response times of 0.5 s for a 30% optical contrast are realized when oxidizing the device. A commercially available conductive poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene):poly(4-styrenesulfonate acid) formulation (PEDOT:PSS) is coated onto the silver grids as a charge balancing polymer, and is in this setting found to be superior to a polypyrrole previously employed in electrochromic devices. In addition, the PEDOT:PSS layer increases the conductivity in the hexagonal grid structure.
DOI
. IntroductionThe development of electrochromic devices (ECDs) has moved from laboratory conditions into pilot plants; whereby, new challenges have emerged that include avoidance of vacuum processing steps and use of simple printing, coating, and lamination methods for deposition and assembly of the devices. If these challenges are successfully addressed, polymer based electrochromic devices will be commercially attractive and competitive to existing solutions. A main obstacle is the replacement of indium-doped tin oxide (ITO) as the transparent electrode material. ITO has been widely used as electrode material in organic electronics, but due to the scarcity of indium, substituting this material for a less expensive one would signifi cantly reduce production costs of ECDs. [1][2][3] Another incitement to replace ITO is the vast amount of energy used in the sputtering process employed in the production of ITO covered substrates. By avoiding such energy consuming processes, one would be able to manufacture ECDs with limited energy consumption from materials, to manufacturing and operation.From an operational point of view, the use of ITO as electrode material in ECDs is problematic since a low concentration of charge carriers in ITO gives rise to a large sheet resistance. It has been established that the electrode resistance has a marked effect on the response time and optical contrast of an ECD, [ 4 ] and high electrode resistance leads to a non-uniform potential across the electrode (Ohmic loss), and a non-uniform current distribution in the electrolyte. [ 5 ] By using electrodes of moderate conductivity, increasing potentials are needed to achieve satisfactory response times and optical contrast, as the ionic mobility (already impeded by the semisolid gel electrolyte) partly depends on the electric fi eld between the two electrodes. Due to several other chemical components, increasing the potential confl icts with the voltage limits, outside of which side reactions are likely to occur. These could be redox reactions of water due to moisture in the device or irreversible oxidation or reduction of the polymer fi...