Efficiency improvement of dye-sensitized solar cell by the composite of titanium dioxide nano particles and electro spun titanium dioxide nanofiber

Abstract

In general Dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC) comprises of an electrode P- 25 titanium dioxide (TiO2), sensitized with Ruthenium based Dye fabricated on a transparent substrate Fluorine doped Tin Oxide (FTO) glass, a Pt counter electrode and an electrolyte between the electrodes. This paper presents, the investigation of increment of photoelectric conversion efficiency (PCE) of DSSC by using optimized composite ratio of 5 % TiO2 electrospun nanofibers with the 95 % of TiO2 nanoparticles by weight. The two sets of DSSCs of one electrode only with TiO2 nanoparticles as reference set of cells and the other being the composition of TiO2 Nano fibers (NFs) with TiO2 nano particles (NPs) and their current 𝐼, voltage 𝑉 and fill factor were measured in order to investigate the photoelectric conversion efficiency. The active area of electrodes were 0.25 𝑐𝑚2. The cells were characterized by current density-voltage (J–V) characteristic, under the solar simulator light of 1000 𝑊 𝑚−2. As a result, PCE of the reference DSSC with pristine TiO2 nano particles electrode was 5.045 %, though the photoelectric conversion efficiency of DSSC with an innovative electrode of 5 % of TiO2 nano fibers with 95 % of TiO2 nano particles were 6.948 %, thus PCE enhanced by 37.72 % for 5 % of TiO2 nano fibers and 95 % TiO2 nano particles composition. Hence the high PCE of the DSSCs by the increased short-circuit photo current by enhanced light harvesting caused by the TiO2 nano fibers given that plenty of dye absorption for light harvesting as well as clever tracks for electrolyte contact.