The Performance of Dye Sensitized Solar Cell Fabricated Using Dye Extracted from Irvingia Gabonensis Leaves

Abstract

The performance of dye sensitized solar cell (DSSC) fabricated using dye extracted from Irvingia gabonensis leaves was analyzed in this work. Ethanol was used as the extracting liquid. The method employed is Sol-gel technique. Fluorine Tin oxide (FTO) was used as electrode while Titanium dioxide (TiO₂) was used to absorb the dye. The counter electrode was coated with carbon. The elemental composition of the Titanium dioxide film deposit was investigated using Energy Dispersive X-ray (EDX), solar simulation was carried out using a Newport solar simulator and the absorption spectrum (light absorbance) of the chlorophyll dyes were measured using UV-1800 series spectrophotometer. The dye has band gap of 1.2 eV and the plot of current density versus voltage (I-V curve) revealed that the open circuit voltage and short-circuit current density of the fabricated solar cell were 0.121 V and -0.0921 mAcm^-2  respectively. The overall conversion efficiency of the cell is 8.53 × 10^-5  % while the fill factor (FF) is -7.6589406. Though the overall conversion efficiency of the fabricated DSSC is relatively low, it can be used in poultry houses where great infrared radiation is needed since the transmittance of the dye at near infrared region is high.