Author: Kevin Alexander Bush

Publisher:

Published: 2018

Total Pages:

ISBN-13:

In under an hour and a half, the sun illuminates the world with enough energy to meet our yearly global energy consumption. And yet, while the world's installed solar capacity tripled from 2012 to 2016, only 1.3% of global energy demands are met by solar. Increasing efficiency is one of the most promising paths to lowering system costs and drive further solar adoption in a heavily commoditized energy market. As the record single-junction efficiencies of perovskite solar cells now rival those of CIGS, CdTe, and the incumbent crystalline silicon, they are becoming increasingly attractive for use in tandem solar cells, due to their wide, tunable bandgap and solution processability. Tandems offers a pathway to surpassing fundamental efficiency limits on single-junction solar cells by extracting a portion of photo-generated carriers at a higher voltage and thus enabling the realization of the next generation of low cost photovoltaic cells. However, poor environmental stability presides as the Achilles heel of perovskites as they are susceptible to moisture ingress, methylammonium iodide egress, and corrosion of metal electrodes by reaction with halides in the perovskite. Additionally, while the bandgap of perovskites can be continuously tuned between 1.5 and 2.3eV by the substitution of bromide for iodide, open circuit voltages have not increased linearly with bandgap, largely negating the benefit of bandgap tuning. This dissertation will begin by focusing on the development of transparent and functional barrier layers to achieve efficient semi-transparent solar cells for use in tandems and simultaneously address the notoriously poor thermal and environmental stability of perovskites. I will show how the combination of a functional barrier layer and a transparent indium tin oxide electrode present a holistic solution to suppressing the three fastest degradation mechanisms in perovskite devices. This enables us to package our devices and pass several industry standard IEC solar cell stability tests. Next, I will present how compositional engineering can be employed to mitigate the effects of one of the primary causing of voltage loss -- halide segregation -- and achieve tandem relevant bandgaps of 1.68eV and 1.75eV. By fabricating our optimized 1.68eV bandgap perovskite with the window layer described previously on top of a heterojunction silicon solar cell, we achieve a record 25% efficient perovskite/silicon tandem. This combination of improved efficiency and stability represents an exciting step forward in achieving commercially viable perovskite tandem solar cells.