The organometal perovskite solar cells have shown stupendous development and have
reached power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 22.1 %. However, the toxicity of lead in
perovskite solar cells is a major challenge towards their incorporation into photovoltaic
devices and thus needs to be addressed. Tin perovskite (CH3NH3SnI3) have attracted a lot of
attention recently and could be a viable alternative material to replace lead perovskite in
thin film solar cells. A detail understanding of effects of each component of a solar cell on
its output performance is needed to further develop the technology. In this work, we
performed a numerical simulation of a planar heterojunction tin based perovskite solar cell
using SCAPS (Solar Cell Capacitance Simulator). Results revealed that thickness and defect
density of the absorber material strongly influence the PCE of the device. Various types of
hole transporting material (HTM) were compared and analysed to improve the performance
of the solar cell. Parameters such as hole mobility and acceptor density of HTM also
signified dependence on PCE of the device. These results indicate the possibility to design,
fabricate and enhance the performance of tin based perovskite solar cells

Aditi, Toshniwal

Akshay, Jariwala

Opanasiuk, Anatolii Serhiiovych

Panchal, C.J.

Vipul, Kheraj

Опанасюк, Анатолий Сергеевич

Опанасюк, Анатолій Сергійович

Electronic Sumy State University Institutional Repository

4TH INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON SEMICONDUCTOR MATERIALS AND DEVICES (ISSMD-4) 8th -10th March, 2017  School of Materials Sciences and Nanotechnology, Jadavpur University, Kolkata - 700 032, India 92   It has been observed that for operating centrifugal pump against higher discharge pressure, the level of irradiance required is quite high to achieve its specific speed for delivering the water and therefore knowing the operating pressure this problem may be minimized by using energy storage devices like battery or supercapacitor operated in parallel with the SPV module. This may help to acquire more solar energy for the water pumping operation. Here is the need to select a proper configuration of solar PV water pumping system (SPVWPS) using energy storage devices for economic application. Therefore in this present work, we optimize the battery- supercapacitor based SPVWPS for a discharge pressure and evaluate the performance parameters. Four different configurations of solar PV water pumping system (SPVWPS) using centrifugal pump are considered, namely, direct coupled, with battery, with the supercapacitor and with battery-supercapacitor hybrid and to determine the optimum configuration for higher system performance. The experiment have been carried out with a 2m static head with variable dynamic head of the pump on sunny days. The comparison of the performance for the different configurations have been evaluated.     Numerical simulation of tin based perovskite solar cell: Effects of absorber parameters and hole transport materials   Aditi Toshniwal1, Akshay Jariwala1, Vipul Kheraj1*, A. S. Opanasyuk2, C. J. Panchal3  1Department of Applied Physics, Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology, Surat-395 007, India. 2Department of Electronics and Computer Technology Sumy State University Sumy, Ukraine. 3Applied Physics Department, Faculty of Technology and Engineering, The M.S. University of Baroda Vadodara-390 001, India.    *Email: vipulkheraj@gmail.com  The organometal perovskite solar cells have shown stupendous development and have reached power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 22.1 %. However, the toxicity of lead in perovskite solar cells is a major challenge towards their incorporation into photovoltaic devices and thus needs to be addressed. Tin perovskite (CH3NH3SnI3) have attracted a lot of attention recently and could be a viable alternative material to replace lead perovskite in thin film solar cells. A detail understanding of effects of each component of a solar cell on its output performance is needed to further develop the technology. In this work, we performed a numerical simulation of a planar heterojunction tin based perovskite solar cell using SCAPS (Solar Cell Capacitance Simulator). Results revealed that thickness and defect density of the absorber material strongly influence the PCE of the device. Various types of hole transporting material (HTM) were compared and analysed to improve the performance of the solar cell. Parameters such as hole mobility and acceptor density of HTM also signified dependence on PCE of the device. These results indicate the possibility to design, fabricate and enhance the performance of tin based perovskite solar cells.   270 

Numerical simulation of tin based perovskite solar cell: Effects of absorber parameters and hole transport materials

The organometal perovskite solar cells have shown stupendous development and have reached a power
conversion efficiency (PCE) of 22.1%. However, the toxicity of lead in perovskite solar cells is a major challenge towards their incorporation into photovoltaic devices and thus needs to be addressed. Tin perovskite
(CH3NH3SnI3) have attracted a lot of attention recently and could be a viable alternative material to replace
lead perovskite in thin film solar cells. A detail understanding of effects of each component of a solar
cell on its output performance is needed to further develop the technology. In this work, we performed a
numerical simulation of a planar heterojunction tin based perovskite solar cell using SCAPS (Solar Cell
Capacitance Simulator). Results revealed that thickness and defect density of the absorber material
strongly influence the PCE of the device. Various types of hole transporting material (HTM) were compared
and analysed to improve the performance of the solar cell. Parameters such as hole mobility and acceptor
density of HTM also signified dependence on PCE of the device. These results indicate the possibility
to design, fabricate and enhance the performance of tin based perovskite solar cells

JOURNAL OF NANO- AND ELECTRONIC PHYSICS ЖУРНАЛ НАНО- ТА ЕЛЕКТРОННОЇ ФІЗИКИ Vol. 9 No 3, 03038(4pp) (2017) Том 9 № 3, 03038(4cc) (2017)   2077-6772/2017/9(3)03038(4) 03038-1  2017 Sumy State University Numerical Simulation of Tin Based Perovskite Solar Cell: Effects of Absorber Parameters and Hole Transport Materials  Aditi Toshniwal1, Akshay Jariwala1, Vipul Kheraj1,*, A.S. Opanasyuk2, C.J. Panchal3  1 Department of Applied Physics, Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology, Surat, 395007, India 2 Sumy State University, 2, Rymskyi-Korsakov Str., 40007 Sumy, Ukraine 3 Applied Physics Department, The M.S. University of Baroda, Vadodara-390001, India  (Received 28 April 2017; revised manuscript received 10 May 2017; published online 30 June 2017)  The organometal perovskite solar cells have shown stupendous development and have reached a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 22.1%. However, the toxicity of lead in perovskite solar cells is a major chal-lenge towards their incorporation into photovoltaic devices and thus needs to be addressed. Tin perovskite (CH3NH3SnI3) have attracted a lot of attention recently and could be a viable alternative material to re-place lead perovskite in thin film solar cells. A detail understanding of effects of each component of a solar cell on its output performance is needed to further develop the technology. In this work, we performed a numerical simulation of a planar heterojunction tin based perovskite solar cell using SCAPS (Solar Cell Capacitance Simulator). Results revealed that thickness and defect density of the absorber material strongly influence the PCE of the device. Various types of hole transporting material (HTM) were com-pared and analysed to improve the performance of the solar cell. Parameters such as hole mobility and ac-ceptor density of HTM also signified dependence on PCE of the device. These results indicate the possibil-ity to design, fabricate and enhance the performance of tin based perovskite solar cells.  Keywords: Tin perovskite Solar Cell, Simulation, HTM, SCAPS.  DOI: 10.21272/jnep.9(3).03038 PACS numbers: 88.40.jm, 05.45.Pq                                                           * vipulkheraj@gmail.com 1. INTRODUCTION  Organic-inorganic metal halide perovskites have gained tremendous attention for their application in high-performance solar cells because of its peculiar features like high conversion efficiency and low-cost processing. The PCEs of such devices have increased from 3.8% [1] in 2009 to 22.1% [2] in early 2016. How-ever, one of the major challenges towards their applica-tion on a major scale is their relative stability and tox-icity induced by lead. The most viable substitution for lead is tin which is also a member of the group 14 ele-ments in the periodic table. Research for alternative absorber materials for synthesis of low-cost and highly efficient solar cells are in great demand recently. Me-thyl ammonium tin iodide (CH3NH3SnI3) perov-skite [3, 4] are highly desirable as photovoltaic materi-al because of its excellent characteristics like direct-bandgap (1.3 eV), a high absorption coefficient and long diffusion length. In addition of being an environmental-ly benign material, it is low-cost, non-toxic and abun-dantly available on earth. The researchers have devel-oped solar cell based on tin perovskite and reported a PCE exceeding 6% [3]. However, there are few issues that need to be addressed before their widespread use in photovoltaic industry: resistance to degradation and replacement of expensive hole transport material (HTM). HTM plays an essential role in a photovoltaic device for determining its stability and PCE. An HTM needs high carrier mobility and should form a defect free interface with the absorbing layer to minimize carrier recombination. So far, there has been no report on the numerical simulation of the tin based perovskite solar cells. Numerical simulation is the best approach to address and understand effects of absorber    Fig. 1 – Schematic diagram of the CH3NH3SnI3 solar cell  layer and HTM on the performance of a solar cell. It is an important tool which can provide significant infor-mation towards the development of the solar device. The simulations were carried out using SCAPS soft-ware [5] developed at the Department of Electronics and Information, University of Gent.  2. SIMULATION PROCEDURE  Here, we have controllably designed a tin based perovskite solar cell model and investigated the effects of thickness and defect density of absorber layer and different HTM on the device behaviour. A planar het-erojunction architecture (Fig. 1) with layer configura-tion of FTO/TiO2 Electron transport material (ETM)/Interface layer 1/absorber layer CH3NH3SnI3/Interface layer 2/(HTM)/Metal contact has been adopted for the simulation. 2, 2’, 7, 7’ – tetrakis (N, N – di-p-methoxyphenyl amine)-9,9’-spirobifluorene (spiro MeOTAD), Cu2O, copper thiocya-nate (CuSCN) and Poly (3-hexylthiophene-2,5-diyl) (P3HT) are used as different HTM for the simulation.  ADITI TOSHNIWAL, AKSHAY JARIWALA ET AL. J. NANO- ELECTRON. PHYS. 9, 03038 (2017)   03038-2 The parameters for different layers in the simulation are chosen on the basis of theoretical considerations, experimental data and existing literature or in some cases, reasonable estimation [3, 4, 6-12]. Thermal veloci-ties of the electron and hole are both set to be equal to 107 cm/s. The tin perovskite shows a p-type conducting behaviour caused by self-doping process of Sn2+’s easy oxidation into Sn4+, so the absorber is a p-type semicon-ductor doped with a carrier density of 1·1019 cm – 3. The defects in the absorption layer are set to be in the neu-tral Gaussian distribution with a characteristic energy of 0.1 eV, with a defect density of 1013 cm – 3. The work function of the FTO and metal contact are considered to be 4.4 eV and 5.10 eV respectively.  3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION  3.1  Effects of Absorber Thickness  To confirm the optimum absorber thickness, simu-lation has been carried out in the range of 50 to 1500 nm. Other parameters are kept constant. The simulated result show that with increasing the absorb-er thickness, Jsc of the device increases apparently and reaches the maximum value  24 mA/cm2 at approxi-mately 400 nm thickness and then decreases as shown in Fig 2a. It is evident from the same figure that Voc rises to an optimal value of 0.682 V at 100-125 nm thickness and then saturates with very slight decay as thickness increases. The relative decrease in Voc is not very significant. Fill factor of the modelled device rises initially upto 200 nm of thickness and further continu-ously decreases from 45.2% to 36.8% with increasing thickness as shown in Fig. 2b.  The nature of PCE curve appears similar to Jsc curve of the device as indicated in Fig 2b. Efficiency reaches to the highest point (6.8%) at  400 nm as simi-lar to Jsc and drops down with further increase in thickness. The results suggest that an optimal thick-ness of 380-500 nm for absorber layer could result in high efficiency tin perovskite solar cells. If the absorber thickness surpasses the optimal value then it results in more excess carriers and more traps which give more opportunity for occurrence of recombination.  3.2 Effects of Defect Density of the Absorber Layer  There are several defects such as vacancies, disloca-tions and grain boundaries which are always present in the absorber and HTM layer. These defects influence carrier recombination, reduction in lifetime and carrier mobility. The simulation has been carried out to study the effects of defect density ranging from 1·1010 - 1·1018 cm – 3 on device performance. It is clear from Fig. 2c, d that the performance of the device is constant up to the defect density of 1·1015 cm – 3 and then reduc-es with further increase in defect density.  3.3 Effects of Hole Mobility and Acceptor Densi-ty of HTM  The HTM layer, Spiro-OMeTAD, is widely used in perovskite solar cells, which has remarkable influence on the device property. To examine the effects of HTM layer characteristics on power conversion efficiency, two typical parameters, hole mobility and acceptor        Fig. 2 – Variation of Open-circuit voltage Voc, Short-circuit current density Jsc, Fill factor FF, and Power conversion effi-ciency (PCE) as functions of absorber thickness (a, b) and de-fect density of the absorber (c, d)  density, are chosen for this study. Fig. 3a shows the results for PCE as a function of hole mobility. It is   NUMERICAL SIMULATION OF TIN BASED PEROVSKITE SOLAR CELL… J. NANO- ELECTRON. PHYS. 9, 03038 (2017)   03038-3    Fig. 3 – Effects of HTM layer characteristics, (a) hole mobility and (b) acceptor density, on PCE of perovskite solar cells    Fig. 4 – Variation of (a) Open-circuit voltage Voc and Short-circuit current density Jsc, (b) Fill factor FF, and PCE as functions of different HTM.  observed that the efficiency shows a maximum satura-tion point (6.7 %) at hole mobility of 1·10 – 3 cm2/Vs. The efficiency experienced a rise with increase of acceptor density as depicted in Fig. 3b. It has been already re-ported that pure Spiro-OMeTAD material has low hole mobility and low acceptor density, which causes a high series resistance and thus restrict the current in the device, leading to an undesirable performance [6]. Therefore, it is a common practice to dope the HTM with additional additives or p-type dopants during fab-rication.  3.4 Effects of Different HTM Layer  Apart from Spiro-OMeTAD, there are many solid-state materials which are widely used as hole transport layer in dye-sensitive solar cells. Performance of these materials is also comparable with Spiro-OMeTAD as reported by many groups. In this study, several mate-rials were selected as HTM candidates and the param-eters for these materials were chosen from reported literatures introduced in the simulation. Basic cell pa-rameters of the device for different HTM layers are represented in Fig. 4. It is noticeable that PCE of the tin perovskite solar cell with typical spiro-MeOTAD as HTM went up to  6.7% which is very close to the ex-perimentally reported [3] efficiency of CH3NH3SnI3 solar cells (6.4%). However, it is noteworthy that CuSCN displays outstanding performance (7.33%) than other HTMs in this study. Cu2O also exhibits better property and similar results like spiro-MeOTAD and could be considered as a good option for HTM. In addi-tion, it can be noticed that P3HT is not a suitable can-didate for tin perovskite solar cells. It is more evident from Fig. 5 which demonstrates comparison of external quantum efficiency when differ-ent HTMs are employed in the designed model. CuSCN shows desirable results throughout the visible and near infrared region as compared to its other counterparts. The variation of efficiency as a function of defect densi-ty of absorber layer and interface layers using all HTMs are shown in Fig. 6. In case of CuSCN as HTM, it shows that the efficiency of the device remains al-most constant with increase in defect density of the absorber layer whereas a drastic drop in efficiency is observed in case of P3HT as defect density exceeds 1·1010 cm – 1.    Fig. 5 – Comparison of external quantum efficiency (EQE) for different HTM   ADITI TOSHNIWAL, AKSHAY JARIWALA ET AL. J. NANO- ELECTRON. PHYS. 9, 03038 (2017)   03038-4   Fig. 6 – Variation of PCE as a function of defect density of HTM and interface layers (IL), IL1 and IL2. 4. CONCLUSION  The CH3NH3SnI3 perovskite solar cell was control-lably designed and simulated using SCAPS. The model was verified by comparing with solar cell performance parameters reported in literatures. Effect of absorber thickness on device property was studied and it indi-cated that an optimal thickness range (350-500 nm) is required for preparing efficient solar cells.Different candidates for HTM were employed and basic cell pa-rameters were discussed. The results illuminate that the solar cells with CuSCN as a HTM can achieve rela-tively higher efficiency which is due to its wide bandgap, high hole mobility, good chemical stability and better chemical interaction with perovskite ab-sorber. Moreover, it is easy to deposit through a solu-tion-processed technique at low temperature which makes it suitable with different substrates.  AKNOWLEDGEMENTS  We acknowledge Dr. Marc Burgelman, University of Gent, Belgium, for providing the SCAPS simulation software. Aditi Toshniwal would like to thank Depart-ment of Science and Technology (DST) for providing her fellowship for carrying out PhD work under IN-SPIRE scheme.  REFERENCES  1. Akihiro Kojima, Kenjiro Teshima, Yasuo Shirai, Tsutomu Miyasaka, J. Am. Chem. Soc., 131, 6050 (2009). 2. NREL chart, http://www.nrel.gov/ncpv/images/efficiency_chart.jpg. 3. N.K. Noel, S. D. Stranks, A. Abate, C. Wehrenfennig, S. Guarnera, A. Haghighirad, A. Sadhanala, G.E. Eperon, S.K. Pathak, M.B. Johnston, A. Petrozza, L. Herz, H. Snaith, Energy Environ. Sci. 7, 3061 (2014). 4. F. Hao, C.C. Stoumpos, D. H. Cao, R.P.H. Chang. M.G. Kanatzidis, Nat. Photonics 8, 489 (2014). 5. M. Burgelman, P. Nollet, S. Degrave, Thin Solid Films 361, 527 (2000). 6. F. Liu, J. Zhu, J. Wei, Y. Li, M. Lv, S. Yang, B. Zhang, J. Yao, S. Dai, Appl. Phys. Lett. 104, 253508 (2014). 7. M.I. Hossain, F.H. Alharbi, N. Tabet, Sol. Energy 120, 370 (2015). 8. T. Minemoto, M. Murata, J. Appl. Phys. 116, 054505 (2014). 9. A. Gagliardi, M.A. der Maur, D. Gentilini, F. di Fonzo, A. Abrusci, H.J. Snaith, G. Divitini, C. Ducatie, A. Di Carlo, Nanoscale 7, 1136 (2015). 10. P. Umari, E. Mosconi, F. De Angelis, Sci. Report. 34, 4467 (2014). 11. A. Khaliq, F.L. Xue, K. Varahramyan, Microelectron. Eng. 86, 2312 (2009). 12. A. Chen, K. Zhu, Q. Shao, Z. Ji, Semicond. Sci. Technol. 31, 065025 (2016).  

Numerical Simulation of Tin Based Perovskite Solar Cell: Effects of Absorber Parameters and Hole Transport Materials

SocioEconomic Challenges Journal (Sumy State University)

JOURNAL OF NANO- AND ELECTRONIC PHYSICS ЖУРНАЛ НАНО- ТА ЕЛЕКТРОННОЇ ФІЗИКИ 
Vol. 9 No 3, 03038(4pp) (2017) Том 9 № 3, 03038(4cc) (2017) 
 
 
2077-6772/2017/9(3)03038(4) 03038-1  2017 Sumy State University 
Numerical Simulation of Tin Based Perovskite Solar Cell: Effects of Absorber Parameters 
and Hole Transport Materials 
 
Aditi Toshniwal1, Akshay Jariwala1, Vipul Kheraj1,*, A.S. Opanasyuk2, C.J. Panchal3 
 
1 Department of Applied Physics, Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology, Surat, 395007, India 
2 Sumy State University, 2, Rymskyi-Korsakov Str., 40007 Sumy, Ukraine 
3 Applied Physics Department, The M.S. University of Baroda, Vadodara-390001, India 
 
(Received 28 April 2017; revised manuscript received 10 May 2017; published online 30 June 2017) 
 
The organometal perovskite solar cells have shown stupendous development and have reached a power 
conversion efficiency (PCE) of 22.1%. However, the toxicity of lead in perovskite solar cells is a major chal-
lenge towards their incorporation into photovoltaic devices and thus needs to be addressed. Tin perovskite 
(CH3NH3SnI3) have attracted a lot of attention recently and could be a viable alternative material to re-
place lead perovskite in thin film solar cells. A detail understanding of effects of each component of a solar 
cell on its output performance is needed to further develop the technology. In this work, we performed a 
numerical simulation of a planar heterojunction tin based perovskite solar cell using SCAPS (Solar Cell 
Capacitance Simulator). Results revealed that thickness and defect density of the absorber material 
strongly influence the PCE of the device. Various types of hole transporting material (HTM) were com-
pared and analysed to improve the performance of the solar cell. Parameters such as hole mobility and ac-
ceptor density of HTM also signified dependence on PCE of the device. These results indicate the possibil-
ity to design, fabricate and enhance the performance of tin based perovskite solar cells. 
 
Keywords: Tin perovskite Solar Cell, Simulation, HTM, SCAPS. 
 
DOI: 10.21272/jnep.9(3).03038 PACS numbers: 88.40.jm, 05.45.Pq 
 
 
                                                        
* vipulkheraj@gmail.com 
1. INTRODUCTION 
 
Organic-inorganic metal halide perovskites have 
gained tremendous attention for their application in 
high-performance solar cells because of its peculiar 
features like high conversion efficiency and low-cost 
processing. The PCEs of such devices have increased 
from 3.8% [1] in 2009 to 22.1% [2] in early 2016. How-
ever, one of the major challenges towards their applica-
tion on a major scale is their relative stability and tox-
icity induced by lead. The most viable substitution for 
lead is tin which is also a member of the group 14 ele-
ments in the periodic table. Research for alternative 
absorber materials for synthesis of low-cost and highly 
efficient solar cells are in great demand recently. Me-
thyl ammonium tin iodide (CH3NH3SnI3) perov-
skite [3, 4] are highly desirable as photovoltaic materi-
al because of its excellent characteristics like direct-
bandgap (1.3 eV), a high absorption coefficient and long 
diffusion length. In addition of being an environmental-
ly benign material, it is low-cost, non-toxic and abun-
dantly available on earth. The researchers have devel-
oped solar cell based on tin perovskite and reported a 
PCE exceeding 6% [3]. However, there are few issues 
that need to be addressed before their widespread use 
in photovoltaic industry: resistance to degradation and 
replacement of expensive hole transport material 
(HTM). HTM plays an essential role in a photovoltaic 
device for determining its stability and PCE. An HTM 
needs high carrier mobility and should form a defect 
free interface with the absorbing layer to minimize 
carrier recombination. So far, there has been no report 
on the numerical simulation of the tin based perovskite 
solar cells. Numerical simulation is the best approach 
to address and understand effects of absorber  
 
 
Fig. 1 – Schematic diagram of the CH3NH3SnI3 solar cell 
 
layer and HTM on the performance of a solar cell. It is 
an important tool which can provide significant infor-
mation towards the development of the solar device. 
The simulations were carried out using SCAPS soft-
ware [5] developed at the Department of Electronics 
and Information, University of Gent. 
 
2. SIMULATION PROCEDURE 
 
Here, we have controllably designed a tin based 
perovskite solar cell model and investigated the effects 
of thickness and defect density of absorber layer and 
different HTM on the device behaviour. A planar het-
erojunction architecture (Fig. 1) with layer configura-
tion of FTO/TiO2 Electron transport material 
(ETM)/Interface layer 1/absorber layer 
CH3NH3SnI3/Interface layer 2/(HTM)/Metal contact 
has been adopted for the simulation. 2, 2’, 7, 7’ – 
tetrakis (N, N – di-p-methoxyphenyl amine)-9,9’-
spirobifluorene (spiro MeOTAD), Cu2O, copper thiocya-
nate (CuSCN) and Poly (3-hexylthiophene-2,5-diyl) 
(P3HT) are used as different HTM for the simulation. 
 ADITI TOSHNIWAL, AKSHAY JARIWALA ET AL. J. NANO- ELECTRON. PHYS. 9, 03038 (2017) 
 
 
03038-2 
The parameters for different layers in the simulation 
are chosen on the basis of theoretical considerations, 
experimental data and existing literature or in some 
cases, reasonable estimation [3, 4, 6-12]. Thermal veloci-
ties of the electron and hole are both set to be equal to 
107 cm/s. The tin perovskite shows a p-type conducting 
behaviour caused by self-doping process of Sn2+’s easy 
oxidation into Sn4+, so the absorber is a p-type semicon-
ductor doped with a carrier density of 1·1019 cm – 3. The 
defects in the absorption layer are set to be in the neu-
tral Gaussian distribution with a characteristic energy of 
0.1 eV, with a defect density of 1013 cm – 3. The work 
function of the FTO and metal contact are considered to 
be 4.4 eV and 5.10 eV respectively. 
 
3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 
 
3.1  Effects of Absorber Thickness 
 
To confirm the optimum absorber thickness, simu-
lation has been carried out in the range of 50 to 
1500 nm. Other parameters are kept constant. The 
simulated result show that with increasing the absorb-
er thickness, Jsc of the device increases apparently and 
reaches the maximum value  24 mA/cm2 at approxi-
mately 400 nm thickness and then decreases as shown 
in Fig 2a. It is evident from the same figure that Voc 
rises to an optimal value of 0.682 V at 100-125 nm 
thickness and then saturates with very slight decay as 
thickness increases. The relative decrease in Voc is not 
very significant. Fill factor of the modelled device rises 
initially upto 200 nm of thickness and further continu-
ously decreases from 45.2% to 36.8% with increasing 
thickness as shown in Fig. 2b.  
The nature of PCE curve appears similar to Jsc 
curve of the device as indicated in Fig 2b. Efficiency 
reaches to the highest point (6.8%) at  400 nm as simi-
lar to Jsc and drops down with further increase in 
thickness. The results suggest that an optimal thick-
ness of 380-500 nm for absorber layer could result in 
high efficiency tin perovskite solar cells. If the absorber 
thickness surpasses the optimal value then it results in 
more excess carriers and more traps which give more 
opportunity for occurrence of recombination. 
 
3.2 Effects of Defect Density of the Absorber 
Layer 
 
There are several defects such as vacancies, disloca-
tions and grain boundaries which are always present in 
the absorber and HTM layer. These defects influence 
carrier recombination, reduction in lifetime and carrier 
mobility. The simulation has been carried out to study 
the effects of defect density ranging from 1·1010 -
 1·1018 cm – 3 on device performance. It is clear from 
Fig. 2c, d that the performance of the device is constant 
up to the defect density of 1·1015 cm – 3 and then reduc-
es with further increase in defect density. 
 
3.3 Effects of Hole Mobility and Acceptor Densi-
ty of HTM 
 
The HTM layer, Spiro-OMeTAD, is widely used in 
perovskite solar cells, which has remarkable influence 
on the device property. To examine the effects of HTM 
layer characteristics on power conversion efficiency, 
two typical parameters, hole mobility and acceptor  
 
 
 
 
 
 
Fig. 2 – Variation of Open-circuit voltage Voc, Short-circuit 
current density Jsc, Fill factor FF, and Power conversion effi-
ciency (PCE) as functions of absorber thickness (a, b) and de-
fect density of the absorber (c, d) 
 
density, are chosen for this study. Fig. 3a shows the 
results for PCE as a function of hole mobility. It is  
 NUMERICAL SIMULATION OF TIN BASED PEROVSKITE SOLAR CELL… J. NANO- ELECTRON. PHYS. 9, 03038 (2017) 
 
 
03038-3 
 
 
 
Fig. 3 – Effects of HTM layer characteristics, (a) hole mobility 
and (b) acceptor density, on PCE of perovskite solar cells 
 
 
 
Fig. 4 – Variation of (a) Open-circuit voltage Voc and Short-
circuit current density Jsc, (b) Fill factor FF, and PCE as 
functions of different HTM. 
 
observed that the efficiency shows a maximum satura-
tion point (6.7 %) at hole mobility of 1·10 – 3 cm2/Vs. The 
efficiency experienced a rise with increase of acceptor 
density as depicted in Fig. 3b. It has been already re-
ported that pure Spiro-OMeTAD material has low hole 
mobility and low acceptor density, which causes a high 
series resistance and thus restrict the current in the 
device, leading to an undesirable performance [6]. 
Therefore, it is a common practice to dope the HTM 
with additional additives or p-type dopants during fab-
rication. 
 
3.4 Effects of Different HTM Layer 
 
Apart from Spiro-OMeTAD, there are many solid-
state materials which are widely used as hole transport 
layer in dye-sensitive solar cells. Performance of these 
materials is also comparable with Spiro-OMeTAD as 
reported by many groups. In this study, several mate-
rials were selected as HTM candidates and the param-
eters for these materials were chosen from reported 
literatures introduced in the simulation. Basic cell pa-
rameters of the device for different HTM layers are 
represented in Fig. 4. It is noticeable that PCE of the 
tin perovskite solar cell with typical spiro-MeOTAD as 
HTM went up to  6.7% which is very close to the ex-
perimentally reported [3] efficiency of CH3NH3SnI3 
solar cells (6.4%). However, it is noteworthy that 
CuSCN displays outstanding performance (7.33%) than 
other HTMs in this study. Cu2O also exhibits better 
property and similar results like spiro-MeOTAD and 
could be considered as a good option for HTM. In addi-
tion, it can be noticed that P3HT is not a suitable can-
didate for tin perovskite solar cells. 
It is more evident from Fig. 5 which demonstrates 
comparison of external quantum efficiency when differ-
ent HTMs are employed in the designed model. CuSCN 
shows desirable results throughout the visible and near 
infrared region as compared to its other counterparts. 
The variation of efficiency as a function of defect densi-
ty of absorber layer and interface layers using all 
HTMs are shown in Fig. 6. In case of CuSCN as HTM, 
it shows that the efficiency of the device remains al-
most constant with increase in defect density of the 
absorber layer whereas a drastic drop in efficiency is 
observed in case of P3HT as defect density exceeds 
1·1010 cm – 1. 
 
 
 
Fig. 5 – Comparison of external quantum efficiency (EQE) for 
different HTM 
 
 ADITI TOSHNIWAL, AKSHAY JARIWALA ET AL. J. NANO- ELECTRON. PHYS. 9, 03038 (2017) 
 
 
03038-4 
 
 
Fig. 6 – Variation of PCE as a function of defect density of 
HTM and interface layers (IL), IL1 and IL2. 
4. CONCLUSION 
 
The CH3NH3SnI3 perovskite solar cell was control-
lably designed and simulated using SCAPS. The model 
was verified by comparing with solar cell performance 
parameters reported in literatures. Effect of absorber 
thickness on device property was studied and it indi-
cated that an optimal thickness range (350-500 nm) is 
required for preparing efficient solar cells.Different 
candidates for HTM were employed and basic cell pa-
rameters were discussed. The results illuminate that 
the solar cells with CuSCN as a HTM can achieve rela-
tively higher efficiency which is due to its wide 
bandgap, high hole mobility, good chemical stability 
and better chemical interaction with perovskite ab-
sorber. Moreover, it is easy to deposit through a solu-
tion-processed technique at low temperature which 
makes it suitable with different substrates. 
 
AKNOWLEDGEMENTS 
 
We acknowledge Dr. Marc Burgelman, University of 
Gent, Belgium, for providing the SCAPS simulation 
software. Aditi Toshniwal would like to thank Depart-
ment of Science and Technology (DST) for providing 
her fellowship for carrying out PhD work under IN-
SPIRE scheme. 
 
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English

4TH INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON SEMICONDUCTOR MATERIALS AND DEVICES (ISSMD-4) 8th -10th March, 2017 
 
School of Materials Sciences and Nanotechnology, Jadavpur University, Kolkata - 700 032, India 92 
 
 
It has been observed that for operating centrifugal pump against higher discharge 
pressure, the level of irradiance required is quite high to achieve its specific speed for 
delivering the water and therefore knowing the operating pressure this problem may be 
minimized by using energy storage devices like battery or supercapacitor operated in 
parallel with the SPV module. This may help to acquire more solar energy for the water 
pumping operation. Here is the need to select a proper configuration of solar PV water 
pumping system (SPVWPS) using energy storage devices for economic application. 
Therefore in this present work, we optimize the battery- supercapacitor based SPVWPS for a 
discharge pressure and evaluate the performance parameters. Four different configurations 
of solar PV water pumping system (SPVWPS) using centrifugal pump are considered, 
namely, direct coupled, with battery, with the supercapacitor and with battery-
supercapacitor hybrid and to determine the optimum configuration for higher system 
performance. The experiment have been carried out with a 2m static head with variable 
dynamic head of the pump on sunny days. The comparison of the performance for the 
different configurations have been evaluated. 
 
 
 
 
Numerical simulation of tin based perovskite solar cell: Effects of absorber 
parameters and hole transport materials 
 
 Aditi Toshniwal
1
, Akshay Jariwala
1
, Vipul Kheraj
1*
, A. S. Opanasyuk
2
, C. J. Panchal
3
 
 
1
Department of Applied Physics, Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology, Surat-
395 007, India. 
2
Department of Electronics and Computer Technology Sumy State University Sumy, Ukraine. 
3
Applied Physics Department, Faculty of Technology and Engineering, The M.S. University 
of Baroda Vadodara-390 001, India.    
*Email: vipulkheraj@gmail.com 
 
The organometal perovskite solar cells have shown stupendous development and have 
reached power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 22.1 %. However, the toxicity of lead in 
perovskite solar cells is a major challenge towards their incorporation into photovoltaic 
devices and thus needs to be addressed. Tin perovskite (CH
3
NH
3
SnI
3
) have attracted a lot of 
attention recently and could be a viable alternative material to replace lead perovskite in 
thin film solar cells. A detail understanding of effects of each component of a solar cell on 
its output performance is needed to further develop the technology. In this work, we 
performed a numerical simulation of a planar heterojunction tin based perovskite solar cell 
using SCAPS (Solar Cell Capacitance Simulator). Results revealed that thickness and defect 
density of the absorber material strongly influence the PCE of the device. Various types of 
hole transporting material (HTM) were compared and analysed to improve the performance 
of the solar cell. Parameters such as hole mobility and acceptor density of HTM also 
signified dependence on PCE of the device. These results indicate the possibility to design, 
fabricate and enhance the performance of tin based perovskite solar cells. 
 
 
270 


http://essuir.sumdu.edu.ua/bitstream/123456789/65508/1/Opanasyuk-92-92.pdf

Numerical simulation of tin based perovskite solar cell: Effects of absorber parameters and hole transport materials

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