Impact of hole-transport layer materials on the field-induced degradation of p-i-n perovskite solar cells

Abstract

Commercialization of perovskite solar cells based on complex lead halides is mostly limited by the low stability of these devices under real solar cell operational conditions. Among the three major intrinsic stress factors affecting the performance of encapsulated solar cells, i.e., heat, light, and electric field, the latter remains the least investigated. In this work, we demonstrate the impact of different hole-transport materials (HTMs), such as PEDOT:PSS, NiO_x, PTAA and hybrid NiO_x/PTAA on the electric field-induced degradation of p-i-n perovskite solar cells assembled using Cs_xFA_1−xPbI₃ as the absorber material. While the applied electric bias was found to degrade all types of devices regardless of the used HTM, the cells assembled with PTAA and NiO_x/PTAA interlayers appeared to be the most stable due to the higher chemical inertness of PTAA to other device components. Our results suggest that further rational design of new HTMs is necessary to make perovskite solar cells sufficiently stable for the targeted practical applications.