Brief review on thin films, perovskite solar cells and nanostructure’s applications

Abstract

In this brief review, we studied the development milestones of thin film photovoltaics (PV) made of CdTe, CIGS, CZTS and perovskite materials and expanded the discussion to the application of graphene and nanotube in the architecture of these devices. Thin film solar cells are alternative for Si-based PVs and reached a comparable performance to Si PVs. However, they mostly suffer from instability in device and performance and thus several research groups considered the application of graphene and nanostructure carbon materials as conductive electrodes of such devices. The stability of such devices has been the main barrier on up-scaling the cell to module level despite the performance being beaten 23% so far. For emerging perovskite solar cells, the main approach of the researchers is to protect the perovskite layer from moisture and humidity degradation by bringing the protective layers such as graphene and nanotubes or carbon deviations into the devices structure. It has been revealed that graphene’s excellent heat dissipation and thermal conductivity can reduce the moisture reaction with perovskite layer which promises device stability at air.