High performance dye-sensitized solar cell based on hydrothermally deposited multiwall carbon nanotube counter electrode

Abstract

Conductive glass was coated with multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) by a hydrothermal method. MWCNTs films were subsequently used as dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC) counter electrodes. The performance of hydrothermal MWCNT DSSC was ∼2.37%. After film annealing in an Ar atmosphere, annealed-hydrothermal MWCNT (AHT-CNT) DSSC efficiency was significantly increased to ∼7.66%, in comparison to ∼8.01% for sputtered-Pt DSSC. Improvement of AHT-CNT DSSC performance is attributed to a decrease in charge-transfer resistance from 1500Ω to 30Ω as observed by electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. © 2012 American Institute of Physics.