Carbon/polymer composite counter‐electrode application in dye‐sensitized solar cells

Carbon black was embedded in mixtures of poly(ethylene oxide) and poly(vinylidene fluoride–hexafluoropropylene) to make a carbon/polymer composite slurry, which was deposited onto a transparent conducting glass substrate by a doctor‐blade coating for application in dye‐sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) as a counter‐electrode (CE) material. The experiments indicated that the photovoltaic parameters of the DSSCs were strongly dependent on the carbon concentration in the slurry. The device with a carbon CE whose mass ratio was 1 : 1 (mass ratio = carbon black mass to polymer mass) exhibited an overall energy conversion efficiency of 4.62%; this was comparable to that of a device with platinum as a CE (5.32%) under the same test conditions. The better electrocatalytic activity of CE‐1.0 (where 1.0 indicates the mass ratio of carbon black to polymer) for the reduction of triiodide resulted a higher performance of the DSSC with such a CE. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci., 2013