Screen printing process control for coating high throughput titanium dioxide films toward printable mesoscopic perovskite solar cells

doi:10.1007/s12200-019-0904-7

Front. Optoelectron.

2019, Vol. 12

Issue (4) : 344-351 https://doi.org/10.1007/s12200-019-0904-7

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Screen printing process control for coating high throughput titanium dioxide films toward printable mesoscopic perovskite solar cells

Zhining WAN, Mi XU, Zhengyang FU, Da LI, Anyi MEI, Yue HU, Yaoguang RONG(

), Hongwei HAN

Michael Grätzel Center for Mesoscopic Solar Cells, Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics, China-EU Institute for Clean and Renewable Energy, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China

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Abstract

Screen printing technique has been widely applied for the manufacturing of both traditional silicon solar cells and emerging photovoltaics such as dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) and perovskite solar cells (PSCs). Particularly, we have developed a printable mesoscopic PSC based on a triple layer scaffold of TiO₂/ZrO₂/carbon. The deposition of the scaffold is entirely based on screen printing process, which provides a promising prospect for low-cost photovoltaics. However, the optimal thickness of the TiO₂ layer for fabricating efficient printable PSCs is much smaller than the typical thickness of screen printed films. Here, we tune the concentration of the pastes and the printing parameters for coating TiO₂ films, and successfully print TiO₂ films with the thickness of 500−550 nm. The correlation between the thickness of the films and printing parameters such as the solid content and viscosity of the pastes, the printing speed and pressure, and the temperature has been investigated. Besides, the edge effect that the edge of the TiO₂ films possesses a much larger thickness and printing positional accuracy have been studied. This work will significantly benefit the further development of printable mesoscopic PSCs.

Keywords screen printing perovskite solar cells (PSCs) thickness parameter control

Corresponding Author(s): Yaoguang RONG

Just Accepted Date: 07 March 2019 Online First Date: 29 April 2019 Issue Date: 30 December 2019

Cite this article:

Zhining WAN,Mi XU,Zhengyang FU, et al. Screen printing process control for coating high throughput titanium dioxide films toward printable mesoscopic perovskite solar cells[J]. Front. Optoelectron., 2019, 12(4): 344-351.

URL:

https://academic.hep.com.cn/foe/EN/10.1007/s12200-019-0904-7
https://academic.hep.com.cn/foe/EN/Y2019/V12/I4/344

Fig.1 (a) Scheme of the fabrication process of printable mesoscopic PSCs; (b) structure of the printable mesoscopic PSC submodules with series-connections; (c) cross-sectional SEM image of the screen printed scaffold

Fig.2 (a) Thickness variations of the screen printed TiO₂ layer with different paste/terpineol mass ratio; (b) statistical distributions of the thickness

Fig.3 (a) Dependence of viscosity of the TiO₂ paste on paste/terpineol mass ratio; (b) dependence of viscosity of the TiO₂ paste on temperature; (c) dependence of the TiO₂ layer thickness on the viscosity; (d) dependence of the TiO₂ layer thickness on the solid content

Fig.4 (a) Dependence of the film thickness on print speed; (b) dependence of the film thickness on print gap; (c) dependence of the film thickness on print pressure

Fig.5 (a) Positional accuracy for printing the TiO₂ films; (b) microscopy image of the edge of printed TiO₂ films on FTO substrate; (c) length accuracy for printing the TiO₂ films; (d) edge effect of the printed TiO₂ films

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