Lowering Toxicity of Solvent in Organic Solar Cells Manufacturing for 20% Efficiency.

Zeng, Rui; Han, Fei; Zhong, Wenkai; Zhang, Ming; Tan, Senke; Lin, Yi; Deng, Jiawei; Zhou, Guanqing et al. · Adv Mater · 2025

basic_science · Level V

Where this comes from

Abstract

Thin film organic photovoltaics (OPVs) aim to harness solar energy environmentally friendly, highly efficient, and cost-effective means, thereby offering a sustainable solution for energy production and ecological preservation. Efforts are undertook to optimize engineering preparation technology for OPV devices and mini-modules, through the development of low-ecological-impact solvent processing method. A newly developed solvent engineering strategy employing environmentally benign o-xylene (OXY) with synergistic dual additives (DIM and DIB) achieved an optimal power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 20.0% (J<sub>SC</sub> of 26.6 mA cm<sup>-2</sup>, V<sub>OC</sub> of 0.935 V, FF of 80.3%) alongside exceptional stability metrics (82%-1500h). The mini-module processed with optimized TCE:OXY (1:3 v/v) solvent demonstrated scalable performance reaching 17.6% (18.4 cm<sup>2</sup>), representing the highest performance achieved in the development safe solvent based OPVs. Suitable microscale patterns contributed to a broader range of receiving angles, enabling more flexible installation geometries for building-integrated applications.