Various Impacts of Blocking Layer on the Cell Stability in Natural Dye Based Dye-synthesized Solar Cell

Abstract

In this paper, various impacts of the blocking layer on the cell stability in natural dye-based DSSC have been investigated. Introducing the blocking layer into the DSSC gives an increase in the photovoltaic performance. Blocking layer increases photogenerated current in the cell by reducing charge carrier recombination. Almost 24% current has been increased in the cell after using the blocking layer. In addition, open circuit voltage and fill factor have also been increased. TiCl4 (blocking layer) treated with TiO2 has been showed 28% higher cell efficiency than without TiCl4 treated with TiO2. The cell performance increased from 0.477% to 0.612%. Furthermore, cell stability test has been carried out by aging the dye molecule in the ambient condition. Cell stability has been experienced by measuring the cell parameter after 360 h, 720 h and 1080 h (under 100 mW/cm2 illumination by standard A.M. 1.5 solar simulator) respectively. An increase in 38∼44.5% cell stability has been found after introducing the blocking layer into the cell.