Materials Research Institute, School of Engineering and Materials Science, Queen Mary University of London, Mile End Road, E1 4NS, London.
Adv Mater. 2016 May;28(20):3802-13. doi: 10.1002/adma.201504085. Epub 2016 Jan 5.
With limited global resources for many of the elements that are found in some of the most common renewable energy technologies, there is a growing need to use "Earth-abundant" elements as a long-term solution to growing energy demands. The dye-sensitized solar cell has the potential to produce low-cost renewable energy, with inexpensive production and most components using Earth-abundant elements. However, the most commonly used material for the cell counter electrode (CE) is platinum, an extremely expensive and rare element. A selection of the materials investigated as alternative CEs are discussed, including metal sulfides, oxides, carbides, and nitrides and carbon-based materials such as carbon nanotubes, graphene, and conductive polymers. As well as having the potential for lower cost, these materials can also produce more-efficient devices due to their high surface area and catalytic activity. Therefore, once issues such as stability have been studied in more detail and scale-up of production methods are considered, there is a very promising future for the replacement of Pt in DSSCs with lower-cost, Earth-abundant alternatives.
由于许多常见可再生能源技术中所使用的元素在全球范围内的资源有限，因此越来越需要使用“丰富的地球”元素作为满足不断增长的能源需求的长期解决方案。染料敏化太阳能电池具有生产低成本可再生能源的潜力，其生产过程廉价，且大多数组件都使用丰富的地球元素。然而，电池对电极（CE）最常用的材料是铂，这是一种极其昂贵且稀有的元素。本文讨论了一些被选为替代 CE 的材料，包括金属硫化物、氧化物、碳化物和氮化物以及碳基材料，如碳纳米管、石墨烯和导电聚合物。除了具有更低的成本潜力外，由于这些材料具有高表面积和催化活性，它们还可以生产更高效的器件。因此，一旦更详细地研究了稳定性等问题，并考虑了生产方法的规模化，那么用低成本、丰富的地球替代品替代 DSSC 中的 Pt 就具有非常广阔的前景。
