Heliyon (Feb 2024)
Development of low-cost and high-efficiency solar modules based on perovskite solar cells for large-scale applications
Abstract
Solar energy has emerged as a viable and competitive renewable resource due to its abundance and cost-effectiveness. To meet the global energy demands, there is a growing need for efficient devices with unique compositions. In this study, we designed and analyzed a perovskite solar cell (PSC) incorporating methylammonium tin iodide (CH3NH3SnI3) as the active optical absorber material, tin iodide (SnO2) as the electron transport layer (ETL), and copper thiocyanate (CuSCN) as the hole transport layer (HTL) using SCAPS-1D software for numerical investigations. Subsequently, the optimized outcomes were implemented in the PVSyst software package to derive the characteristics of a solar module based on the proposed novel solar cell composition. The objective of our research was to enhance the stability of solar cell for use in solar module. This was achieved by optimizing the thicknesses of the compositional layers which resulted in the enhancement of excess electron and hole mobilities and a reduction in defect densities, thereby leading to an improvement in the device performance. The optimization of excess electron and hole mobilities, as well as defect densities, was conducted to improve the device performance. SCAPS calculations indicated that the perovskite absorber layer (CH3NH3SnI3) may achieve the best possible performance with a maximum optimized thickness of 3.2 μm. The optimized thickness value for CuSCN-HTL and SnO2-ETL were found to be 0.07 μm and 0.05 μm respectively resulting in a maximum power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 23.57%. Variations in open circuit voltage (Voc), short circuit current (Jsc), fill factor (FF %), and quantum efficiency (QE) associated with the optimized thickness values of all layers in the ITO/SnO2/CH3NH3SnI3/CuSCN/Mo composition were critically analyzed. The use of these input parameters resulted in power creation of 557.4 W for a module consisting of 72 cells with an annual performance ratio of 80.3%. These recent investigations are expected to be effective in the design and fabrication of eco-friendly and high-performance solar cells in terms of efficiency.
