title: Pt- and TCO-Free Flexible Cathode for DSSC from Highly Conducting and Flexible PEDOT Paper Prepared via in Situ Interfacial Polymerization.
abstract: Here, we report the preparation of a flexible, free-standing, Pt- and TCO-free counter electrode in dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC)-derived from polyethylenedioxythiophene (PEDOT)-impregnated cellulose paper. The synthetic strategy of making the thin flexible PEDOT paper is simple and scalable, which can be achieved via in situ polymerization all through a roll coating technique. The very low sheet resistance (4 Ω/□) obtained from a film of 40 μm thick PEDOT paper (PEDOT-p-5) is found to be superior to the conventional fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO) substrate. The high conductivity (357 S/cm) displayed by PEDOT-p-5 is observed to be stable under ambient conditions as well as flexible and bending conditions. With all of these features in place, we could develop an efficient Pt- and TCO-free flexible counter electrode from PEDOT-p-5 for DSSC applications. The catalytic activity toward the tri-iodide reduction of the flexible electrode is analyzed by adopting various electrochemical methodologies. PEDOT-p-5 is found to display higher exchange current density (7.12 mA/cm(2)) and low charge transfer resistance (4.6 Ω) compared to the benchmark Pt-coated FTO glass (2.40 mA/cm(2) and 9.4 Ω, respectively). Further, a DSSC fabricated using PEDOT-p-5 as the counter electrode displays a comparable efficiency of 6.1% relative to 6.9% delivered by a system based on Pt/FTO as the counter electrode.
authors.affiliation: Physical and Materials Chemistry Division, CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory , Pune 411008, Maharashtra, India.|Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research (AcSIR) , Anusandhan Bhawan, 2, Rafi Marg, New Delhi 110 001, New Delhi India.
authors.forename: Bihag
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Anothumakkool
authors.affiliation: Physical and Materials Chemistry Division, CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory , Pune 411008, Maharashtra, India.|Network Institute of Solar Energy (CSIR-NISE) , 122 005New Delhi, India.
authors.forename: Ishita
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Agrawal
authors.affiliation: Physical and Materials Chemistry Division, CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory , Pune 411008, Maharashtra, India.|Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research (AcSIR) , Anusandhan Bhawan, 2, Rafi Marg, New Delhi 110 001, New Delhi India.
authors.forename: Siddheshwar N
authors.initials: SN
authors.lastname: Bhange
authors.affiliation: Physical and Materials Chemistry Division, CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory , Pune 411008, Maharashtra, India.|Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research (AcSIR) , Anusandhan Bhawan, 2, Rafi Marg, New Delhi 110 001, New Delhi India.
authors.forename: Roby
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Soni
authors.affiliation: Physical and Materials Chemistry Division, CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory , Pune 411008, Maharashtra, India.|Network Institute of Solar Energy (CSIR-NISE) , 122 005New Delhi, India.
authors.forename: Onkar
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Game
authors.affiliation: Physical and Materials Chemistry Division, CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory , Pune 411008, Maharashtra, India.|Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research (AcSIR) , Anusandhan Bhawan, 2, Rafi Marg, New Delhi 110 001, New Delhi India.|Network Institute of Solar Energy (CSIR-NISE) , 122 005New Delhi, India.|Department of Physics and Centre for Energy Science, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research , Dr. Homi Bhabha Road, Pune 411 008, India.
authors.forename: Satishchandra B
authors.initials: SB
authors.lastname: Ogale
authors.affiliation: Physical and Materials Chemistry Division, CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory , Pune 411008, Maharashtra, India.|Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research (AcSIR) , Anusandhan Bhawan, 2, Rafi Marg, New Delhi 110 001, New Delhi India.
authors.forename: Sreekumar
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Kurungot
keywords: counter electrode; dye-sensitized solar cell; flexible and thin devices; impedance analysis; interfacial polymerization; polyethylenedioxythiophene