Volatile organic compounds are ghosts for organic solar cells

Abstract

All our efforts to demonstrate a multifunctional device – photovoltaic gas sensor (i.e. solar cell which show photovoltaic action depending on the gas / volatile organic compounds (VOC) in the surrounding atmosphere) yielded negative results. Photovoltaic performance of the organic solar cells under study degraded – almost permanently by exposing them to volatile organic compounds (VOCs). Although, the proposed multifunctional device could not be demonstrated; Present investigations yielded very important result that organic solar cells have problems not only with oxygen and humidity (known facts) but also with many VOCs and hazardous gases – making lamination / encapsulation step mandatory for their practical utilization