Preparation of Activated Carbon/MoS ₂ Nanospheres Composite as Pt‐free Counter Electrode for Efficient Solid State Dye Sensitized Solar Cell

Abstract Carbon‐based materials, particularly activated carbon generated from waste, have attracted much interest as ideal alternatives to platinum as a counter electrode in dye sensitized solar cells due to their high catalytic activity, and low cost. The use of composite materials in conjunction with activated carbon improves the performance due to its multi‐functionality. A composite paste of activated carbon from corn cobs and Molybdenum disulfide nanospheres were used to prepare a counter electrode. The prepared counter electrode exhibits low charge transfer resistance at the electrolyte‐electrode interface. The solution casting method was used to make nanocomposite polymer electrolyte films out of a blend of two polymers, polyvinyl alcohol and carboxymethyl cellulose, packed with various amounts of montmorillorite and graphene as primary and secondary nanofillers. Electrical impedance spectroscopy experiments at room temperature revealed that the addition of secondary nanofiller enhanced the electrical conductivity of the electrolyte films from 3.6 × 10 −4 to 8.4 × 10 −3 S cm −1 due to its capacity to form conductive layers in this polymer blend based electrolyte film. The fabricated synthetic dye based solar cell which uses an innovative counter electrode and nanocomposite polymer electrolyte outperformed platinum electrode with an efficiency of 4.34% and a fill factor of 61%.