Low-cost monolithic dye-sensitized solar cells fabricated on single conductive substrate

Monolithic dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSC) based on mesoporous titanium dioxide deposited on single conductive fluorine-doped tin oxide substrates have been developed. A titania photoactive layer, zirconia spacer, and porous carbon composite containing graphite as counter-electrode and catalytic layer were deposited through layer by layer process using industrially-adaptable method, i.e. screen printing technique. Our results demonstrated that the thickness of zirconia played an important role in determining the photoconversion efficiency of the constructed solar cells. Current-voltage measurements under simulated solar irradiation with an intensity of 0.5 sun showed that the optimized cell could achieve an open circuit voltage and short circuit current of 0.53 V and 45.64 mA, respectively, with an overall efficiency of 0.04 %. Although these figures are still lower compared to our previous cells that were fabricated using conventional sandwich structure, the monolithic DSSC fabricated in this work demonstrates great potential for further commercialization due to the significant reduction in the cost of conductive substrate.