The high voltage required to overcome the thermodynamic threshold and the complicated kinetics of the water splitting reaction limit the efficiency of single semiconductor-based photoelectrochemistry.A semiconductor/s...The high voltage required to overcome the thermodynamic threshold and the complicated kinetics of the water splitting reaction limit the efficiency of single semiconductor-based photoelectrochemistry.A semiconductor/solar cell tandem structure has been theoretically demonstrated as a viable path to achieve an efficient direct transformation of sunlight into chemical energy.However,compact designs exhibiting the indispensable optimally balanced light absorption have not been demonstrated.In the current work,we design and implement a compact tandem providing the complementary absorption of a highly transparent BiVO_(4)photoanode and a PM6:Y6 solar cell.Such bandgap combination approaches the optimal to reach the solar-to-hydrogen(STH)conversion upper limit for tandem photoelectrochemical cells(PECs).We demonstrate that,by using a photonic multilayer structure to adequately balance sunlight absorption among both tandem materials,a 25%increase in the bias-free STH conversion can be achieved,setting a clear path to take compact tandem PECs to the theoretical limit performance.展开更多
基金the financial support by the European Commission through the LICROX project(grant 951843)partially funded by Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación(grants Nos.CEX2019000910-S and PID2020-112650RB-I00)+3 种基金FundacióCellex,FundacióMir-Puig,and Generalitat de Catalunya through Centres de Recerca de Catalunyathe financial support by the Agencia Estatal de Investigación(grant PRE2018-084881)support from the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación/Agencia Estatal de Investigación(grant FJC2020-043223-I)the Severo Ochoa Excel ence Post-doctoral Fellowship(grant CEX2019000910-S)
文摘The high voltage required to overcome the thermodynamic threshold and the complicated kinetics of the water splitting reaction limit the efficiency of single semiconductor-based photoelectrochemistry.A semiconductor/solar cell tandem structure has been theoretically demonstrated as a viable path to achieve an efficient direct transformation of sunlight into chemical energy.However,compact designs exhibiting the indispensable optimally balanced light absorption have not been demonstrated.In the current work,we design and implement a compact tandem providing the complementary absorption of a highly transparent BiVO_(4)photoanode and a PM6:Y6 solar cell.Such bandgap combination approaches the optimal to reach the solar-to-hydrogen(STH)conversion upper limit for tandem photoelectrochemical cells(PECs).We demonstrate that,by using a photonic multilayer structure to adequately balance sunlight absorption among both tandem materials,a 25%increase in the bias-free STH conversion can be achieved,setting a clear path to take compact tandem PECs to the theoretical limit performance.
