Inorganic CuFeO2 Delafossite Nanoparticles as Effective Hole Transport Material for Highly Efficient and Long-Term Stable Perovskite Solar Cells

The regular architecture (n-i-p) of perovskite solar cells (PSCs) has an ascendant interest in the renewable energy field, owing to high certified efficiencies in the recent years. However, there are still serious obstacles of PSCs associated with spiro-OMeTAD hole transport material (HTM), such as: i-) prohibitively expensive material cost (~150-500 $/g) and ii-) operational instability at elevated temperatures and high humidity levels. Herein, we have reported the highly photo-, thermal- and moisture-stable and cost-effective PSCs employing inorganic CuFeO2 delafossite nanoparticles as HTM layer, for the first time. By exhibiting superior hole mobility and additive-free nature, the best-performing cell achieved a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 15.6% with a negligible hysteresis. Despite exhibiting the lower PCE as compared to spiro-OMeTAD-based control cell (19.1%), non-encapsulated CuFeO2-based cells maintained above 85% of their initial efficiency, while the PCE of control cells dropped to ~10% ...