Influence of ionic additives NaI/I2 on the properties of polymer gel electrolyte and performance of quasi-solid-state dye-sensitized solar cells

The ionic additives NaI/I2 in polymer gel electrolyte not only provide cations, but also affect the liquid electrolyte absorbency of the poly(acrylic acid)–poly(ethylene glycol) hybrid, which results in the change of ionic conductivity of polymer gel electrolyte and the photovoltaic performance of quasi-solid-state dye-sensitized solar cell. With the optimized components of liquid electrolyte containing 0.5 M NaI, 0.05 M I2, 0.4 M pyridine, 70 vol.% γ-butyrolactone and 30 vol.% N-methylpyrrolidone, a 4.74% power conversion efficiency of quasi-solid-state dye-sensitized solar cell was obtained under 100 mW cm−2 (AM 1.5) irradiation.