Preparation of Titanium Dioxide Paste for Dye Sensitized Solar Cells (DSSCs)

Abstract

A dye-sensitized solar cell based on TiO2 electrode was prepared by mixing the TiO2 nanopowder and TiCl4 aqueous solution, in which the mixture was used as the paste to deposit onto the fluorine doped tin oxide (FTO) coated glass substrates by screen-printing method. DSSC were created after a rinse of TiO2 electrode with acetonitrile to remove excess dye molecules. The synthesis and characterization of the TiO2 paste was figured out by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The TiO2 layer is homogeneous and composed of anatase and rutile particles. The photocurrent-voltage of the cell was fabricated and the comparison dye was made by using the eosin Y and N719. The sample that use N719 dye showed the better result which is generating a short-circuit photocurrent density of 0.0299 mA/cm2, an open-circuit voltage of 0.713 V, and the energy conversion efficiency was 0.08926 %.