Simulation of efficient Sn/Pb-based formamidinium perovskite solar cells with variation of electron transport layers

Abstract

Abstract Numerical modelling on functional Sn-based perovskite solar cells (PSCs) has been performed and compared with Pb-based PSCs by using general-purpose photovoltaic device model software. The effect of variation in active layer thickness and various electron transport layers (ETLs), including tin oxide (SnO2), zinc oxide, C60, titanium dioxide, phenyl-C61- butyric acid methyl ester, on the photovoltaic parameters of Sn-based PSCs has been investigated. The active layer thickness was observed to be 500 nm, and SnO2 as ETL material resulted in the most efficient PSC. The optimized Sn-based device with formamidinium tin iodide as perovskite active layer shows promising results with a maximum power conversion efficiency of 24.41% compared to 27.49% for formamidinium lead iodide-based device. Further, other photovoltaic parameters for lead free PSC devices are quite comparable as for lead-based devices, showing the potential of Sn-based perovskite material as a fair candidate to replace toxic Pb-based-PSCs.