Rational design of LaNiO₃/carbon composites as outstanding platinum-free photocathodes in dye-sensitized solar cells with enhanced catalysis for the triiodide reduction reaction
Date
2017
Authors
Wang, W.
Liu, Y.
Zhong, Y.
Wang, L.
Zhou, W.
Wang, S.
Tade, M.O.
Shao, Z.
Editors
Advisors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Type:
Journal article
Citation
Solar RRL, 2017; 1(7):1700074-1-1700074-9
Statement of Responsibility
Wei Wang, Yu Liu, Yijun Zhong, Lianzhou Wang, Wei Zhou, Shaobin Wang, Moses O. Tadé, and Zongping Shao
Conference Name
Abstract
In many photovoltaics (PVs), including dye‐sensitized solar cells (DSSCs), triiodide/iodide (I₃⁻/I⁻) redox couple plays an important role, and an active and stable electrocatalyst is required for promoting I₃⁻ reduction reaction (IRR) to minimize efficiency losses. Platinum (Pt) is the state‐of‐the‐art electrocatalyst for IRR, which unfortunately suffers from high cost and poor stability. Herein, strongly coupled LaNiO₃ perovskite/carbon composites are developed for the first time as highly efficient, stable and low‐cost electrocatalysts for IRR to enable better DSSCs. High‐energy ball milling of crystallized LaNiO₃ with carbon material is applied for the facile synthesis of LaNiO₃/carbon composites. This ball‐milling process simultaneously leads to partial reduction of LaNiO₃ by carbon with the creation of oxygen vacancies inside the perovskite oxide lattice, a decrease in LaNiO₃ particle size and the creation of strong coupling between LaNiO₃ and carbon. Particularly, DSSC with LaNiO₃/multi‐walled carbon nanotubes photocathode delivers a high power conversion efficiency of 9.81% with an attractive enhancement of 21% compared with Pt electrocatalyst, superior to most state‐of‐the‐art highly efficient Pt‐free photocathodes in DSSCs. LaNiO₃ or carbon alone demonstrates a much poorer performance. Moreover, LaNiO₃/carbon composites demonstrate excellent operational stability. This study highlights the extended applications of perovskites in other I₃⁻/I⁻‐mediated PVs, electrochromic devices or batteries.
School/Discipline
Dissertation Note
Provenance
Description
Published online: June 20, 2017
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© 2017 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim