Open Access

ARTICLE

Thermally and UV Stable Natural Dyes with Potential Use in Efficient Photoelectrochemical Devices

Mario Alejandro Mejía Escobar^*, Franklin Jaramillo^*

Centro de Investigación, Innovación y Desarrollo de Materiales – CIDEMAT, Universidad de Antioquia UdeA, Calle 70 No. 52-21, Medellín, Colombia

* Corresponding Authors: ;

Journal of Renewable Materials 2015, 3(4), 302-317. https://doi.org/10.7569/JRM.2014.634121

Received 12 December 2014; Accepted 10 August 2015;

Abstract

Energy alternatives have been one of the most important research focal areas of the last decade due to the imminent lack of fossil fuels. This motivation has allowed the evolution of the materials science field in areas such as electrochemistry, where high availability, low cost and negligible environmental impact are the desired principal qualities. For this reason, as an example of a photoelectrochemical device, we have proposed the use of natural dyes from 37 agro-industrial wastes in dye-sensitized solar cells. We obtained dyes from red cabbage, radish and roselle wastes with a good stability for eight hours with a constant dose of UV radiation at 60 °C. In these, a strong copigmentation effect was observed at 90 °C in a few hours. Besides which, an increase in the absorption spectra close to 200% was reached with the media extraction proposed. Additionally, the fabricated solar devices reached efficiencies between 0.5% and 1.7%.

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