Commercially available teas as possible dyes for dye-sensitized solar cells

Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) have the advantage over common silicon-based solar cells that they can be produced from inexpensive and non-toxic materials. Using such materials, however, results in small efficiencies, which makes them most suitable if large areas can be used, such as textile architecture. Finding easily available dyes with reliable properties, however, is not easy if only natural dyes are taken into consideration. A very simple method which is also often used for scholarly experiments is using dyes from teas which are available in a constant quality all over the year. Here we depict differences between a broad variety of commercially available teas, applied on DSSCs built on glass and on flexible conductive foils. Some teas show higher initial efficiencies, while others result in a higher longevity of the cells. Generally, several teas give good results in the same order of magnitude as other typical natural dyes.