Executive Summary : | Photovoltaic (PV) technology is a promising solution to the energy crisis, with Organic Solar Cells (OSCs) being a promising green replacement. OSCs have advantages such as light weight, flexibility, low temperature processing, and low light working. The active layer in OSCs is made up of bulk heterojunction (BHJ) with donor (p-type) and acceptor (n-type). Fullerenes are commonly used as an acceptor due to their superior charge transport properties but have drawbacks such as difficulty in functionalization, restricted absorption, instability, poor mechanical properties, and high production costs. Non-fullerene acceptor (NFA) is used in BHJ along with donor for better charge transport, light harvesting, exciton diffusion length, and electron mobility. Power conversion efficiency (PCE) with NFA in single and multiple-junction has surpassed 18% and 19%, respectively. This research focuses on NFA-based OSC processed in ambient conditions. Inverted architecture is effective due to favorable vertical phase separation and avoidance of high work function cathode material. The proposal emphasizes fabricating inverted OSC with cathode interlayer (CIL), which aligns energy levels and enhances power conversion efficiency (PCE) over 17% in single junction OSC. Self-assembly approach is proposed to simplify device fabrication and improve PCE by suppressing trap-assisted recombination and induced ordered molecular stacking. Spin-coated devices show increased PCE in controlled environments but are hard to scale up. Blade-coating is scalable but lacks uniformity and reproducibility. Slot-die coating is a lab-scale R2R process that enables solution processing on rigid and flexible substrates, moving from lab to fab. Overall, this proposal focuses on fabricating 65 sq. inch OPV modules with self-assembled CIL in ambient conditions using green solvent through slot-die coating. |