Effect of TiO2 Morphology and Plasmonic Nanoparticles Incorporation on Photovoltaic Performance of Dye Sensitized Solar Cell

Abstract

Energy demand is inevitable to support the growth of technological advancement and to fulfill the human necessity in a sophisticated manner. Considering the fact, it is expected to utilize the renewable energy resources for the future generation by overcoming the present global warming and environmental pollution with the limited or avoiding the use of fossil fuels and nuclear resources. Photovoltaic devices are one of the energy generating resources providing an electrical energy from the direct conversion of photons from sunlight. Among the various existing photovoltaic devices, dye sensitized solar cells (DSSC) have attracted the scientist for the past decades and we have made an attempt to investigate the details and present as the scope of the thesis work. It is expected to have high performance, including the stability and lifetime without degradation, in the dye sensitized solar cell for the large-scale production towards the commercialization. It is found that TiO2 morphologies have a great impact on the device performance. This research work focuses on obtaining dual morphology TiO2 particles to enhance the photovoltaic device performance. The experimental outcome shows nanospheres with nanoparticles, microsphere decorated with nanoparticles and nanoparticles with stone like features via reflux method and rod/spherical, solid microspheres/nanoparticles via hydrothermal method were obtained by single step preparation which are exhibiting multifunctional properties such as electron transport, scattering center and providing higher surface area for the preparation of working electrode. Our photoanodes were prepared from the binder free paste of TiO2 powders by adopting a simple screen-printing process. The novel solid microspheres/nanoparticles of TiO2 photoanode offered higher power conversion efficiency during the performance of the DSSC device characterization. newlineThe TiO2 matrix was decorated by drop casting the spherical shaped Ag/Au, multishaped Ag, and multishaped Ag/spherical Au nanoparticles, respecti