Dye sensitized solar cells with carbon mixed conducting polymer counter electrodes

In this study, we replace the traditional platinum counter electrode (CE) by composite poly(3,4-thylenedioxythiophene): poly(styrenesulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) and carbon black (CB) in the dye sensitized solar cell. The pure PEDOT:PSS CEs show the good redox potential and conductivity with appropriate open-circuit voltage (Voc) and short-circuit current density (Jsc), but the low redox ability results in bad fill factor (FF) of devices. After mixing PEDOT:PSS with CB, the redox activity is improved thus enhance the FF from 42.21% to 66.61% and efficiency from 5.31% to 6.99%. Meantime, the performance of PEDOT:PSS can also be improved through sulfidation treatment. The optimums device shows the efficiency of 8.75% with the Jsc of 17.67 mA/cm2, Voc of 0.75 V and FF of66.03%.