Development of Large Area Quantum Dot Sensitized Solar Cell Flexible Substrate Materials and Encapsulation Technologies

Due to the rising petroleum price and environment awareness, solar cells have become the best candidates for green energy resources, and the related industry has been quickly developed. However, the current status in product technologies and costs still require more research and development to provide sustainable growth, especially new material concept and novel device technology. This project will focus on the development of large area quantum dot sensitized solar cell preparation and characterization, especially the flexible substrate materials and the encapsulation technologies. The opto-electric conversion efficiency and life time can be improved by the integration of new materials, suitable processes, and novel device designs. Our team will develop high efficient flexible quantum dot sensitized solar cells with own technologies. This will gradually establish the industry competitiveness in the thin film solar cell sector. The advantages of flexible substrates for solar cells include light and thin, impact resistance, possible rolling process for mass production, and flexibility for creative designs. However, to achieve these goals, we still need to improve the following characteristics, including excellent light transparency, good heat resistance, low coefficient in thermal expansion, good dimensional stability, environmental durability, and good contact properties with the other coating materials. Therefore, it is important to design flexible solar cells with good production yield and life stability. This will rely on the encapsulation and assembly technologies. We will investigate large area quantum dot sensitized solar cell flexible substrates, including PET/ITO, PET/FTO, PET/ITiO, PEN/ITiO, PI/ITiO, and the combination with mosaic metal foils. The solar cell encapsulation materials will include UV curable sealants, hot-melt sealants, epoxy, EVA, acrylate and silicone in the assembly processes. The experimental experiences in flexible organic light emitting diodes and thin film transistors will benefit our current studies. Some optical software packages will be employed for optical characteristics simulation and theoretical verification. This project aims at high quality, flexible, large area quantum dot sensitized solar cells with the research team. In addition to the practical implementation of solar cell assembly, we will also study the interfacial characteristics among the multiple layer cell structures. The results should help to improve the opto-electric conversion efficiency and performance, stability and durability, of the novel sulfide quantum dot sensitized solar cells. The targets for flexible quantum dot sensitized solar cells are conversion efficiency of 7% with the cell area of 5 cm2. The cell stability should maintain 80% of the original efficiency after 200 h testing.

Project ID:PB10207-1818
External Project ID:NSC102-2221-E182-035