Silicon nanowire solar cells grown by PECVD

Silicon nanowires offer an opportunity to improve light trapping in low-cost silicon photovoltaic cells. We have grown radial junctions of hydrogenated amorphous silicon over p-doped crystalline silicon nanowires in a single pump-down plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition process on glass substrates. By using Sn catalysts and boosting p-type doping in the nanowires, the open-circuit voltage of the devices increased from 200 to 800 mV. Light trapping was optimized by extending the length of nanowires in these devices from 1 to 3 μm, producing currents in excess of – 13 mA cm^? 2 and energy conversion efficiencies of 5.6%. The advantages of using thinner window layers to increase blue spectral response were also assessed.     

用于HIT太阳能电池的ITO薄膜制备与性能研究

采用中频脉冲磁控溅射工艺制备ITO薄膜,研究了衬底温度和溅射功率对薄膜性能的影响.通过对二者的优化,获得了方阻为2.99Ω/□,电阻率为1.76×10-4Ω·cm,可见光波段(400～800 nm)平均透过率为82.3;的ITO薄膜.将优化后的薄膜用于电池上,制出了转化效率为14.04;的HIT太阳能电池.     

单晶硅衬底上Ge填埋层低温应力诱导重结晶制备多晶硅薄膜

本文采用电子束蒸发法,室温下在Si(400)的基片上生长含锗(Ge)填埋层的非晶硅薄膜,其结构为a-Si/Ge/Sisubstrate,并在真空中进行后续退火.采用Raman散射(Raman Scattering)、X射线衍射(X-ray Diffraction)、高分辨电子扫描显微镜(HRSEM)、光学显微镜和热重差热分析(DSC)等手段,研究退火后样品晶化特性和晶化机理.结果表明,室温下生长的含有250 nm Ge填埋层的生长态样品在400℃退火5h,薄膜基本全部实现晶化,并表现出明显的Si (111)择优取向.样品分别在400℃、500℃、600℃和700℃退火后薄膜的横向光学波的波峰均在519cm-1附近,半高宽大约为6.1 cm-1,且均在Si(111)方向高度择优生长.退火温度为600℃的样品对应的晶粒尺寸约为20 μm.然而,在相同的薄膜结构(a-Si/Ge/Si substrate)的前提下,当把生长温度提高到300℃时,温度高达到700℃退火时间5h后,薄膜依然是非晶硅状态.差热分析表明,室温生长的样品,在后续退火过程中伴随界面应力的释放,从而诱导非晶硅薄膜重结晶成多晶硅薄膜.     

Drift-mobility characterization of silicon thin-film solar cells using photocapacitance

We have applied the photocapacitance method to the measurements of hole drift-mobilities in silicon solar cells. We found a simple analysis that yields drift-mobilities even in the presence of anomalously dispersive transport. On one thick sample we measured the hole drift-mobility using both the photocapacitance and the time-of-flight methods; the two methods gave results that were consistent with each other and with the established bandtail multiple-trapping model. We then applied the method to thinner samples that are more characteristic of the conditions in solar modules, but are not generally usable for the time-of-flight method. These samples showed much smaller hole drift-mobilities than expected from the bandtail trapping model. We speculate that the hole drift-mobility has smaller values in regions close to the substrate during deposition than has been reported for thicker samples.     

Alternative designs for nanocrystalline silicon solar cells

We discuss the use of two alternative design techniques for enhancing the performance of nanocrystalline Si solar cells. The first technique involves the use of alternating layers of nanocrystalline and amorphous silicon, where the amorphous silicon layer is used to effectively passivate the grain boundaries in nano Si. We show that the use of amorphous Si layer increases photon absorption and leads to higher quantum efficiency in infrared wavelength. The second design involves enhancing the grains in nano Si by growing at higher temperatures, followed by anneal in a hydrogen plasma to preserve grain boundary passivation. This technique results in significant improvement in infrared quantum efficiency of solar cells while preserving good electronic properties.     

轴向磁场对环形浅液池内硅熔体热毛细对流的影响

为了更好地了解轴向磁场对温度梯度作用下Marangoni-热毛细对流的影响,采用有限差分法对环形浅液池内硅熔体制单晶的流动进行了数值模拟.研究了三种不同边界条件下,Ha数分别为0、10、20、30对应下硅熔体内部流动强度和自由表面速度.结果表明,轴向磁场对浅液池内的Marangoni对流、热毛细对流和耦合的Marangoni-热毛细对流都有较好的抑制作用,且随着磁场强度的增强,抑制作用增加,更有利于提高晶体的结晶质量.当磁场强度和底部热流密度一定时,随着水平温度梯度的增加,靠近内壁的流动得到增强,外壁附近流动反而减弱.     

Surface characterisation of wafers for silicon-heterojunction solar cells

Silicon-heterojunction cells represent a fast-growing, very promising field in photovoltaics. The key issues from the scientific and technological point of view are directly related to the quality of the junction interface (i.e., to that of the wafer surface just before thin-film deposition). The chemical purity of this surface and its dependence on HF chemical etching have been studied by XPS. Possible surface damage has been checked by SEM. Polished, rough and textured wafers have been tested. Textured samples have impurities derived from the previous pyramid-etching process. A brief (2 min) dipping in very diluted (only 1%) HF is enough to remove the 5-nm native-oxide layer. More aggressive treatments only increase surface reactivity. No surface damage is appreciated in the SEM images, not even in those of the samples etched with the highest concentrations and/or for the longest times.     

Ag纳米蛾膜结构阵列对薄膜硅太阳能电池光吸收的影响

设计了一种带有Ag纳米蛾膜结构阵列的薄膜硅太阳能电池背反射器.采用时域有限差分(FDTD)法,系统仿真研究了Ag纳米蛾膜阵列的底部直径、高度、阵列周期常数对薄膜硅太阳能电池光吸收的影响.仿真结果表明,Ag纳米蛾膜结构最佳结构参数为:d=60 nm,a=120 nm,h =100 nm.吸收光谱表明带有Ag纳米蛾膜结构的薄膜硅太阳能电池可有效增加700～ 1200 nm波段范围的光,同带有Ag层的薄膜硅太阳能电池相比,光吸收平均增强53.8;,这是因为Si/Ag界面产生表面等离子体共振现象所致.     

基于AAO纳米光栅的薄膜硅太阳能电池表面减反结构设计与仿真

提出了一种新型的表面带有阳极氧化铝(AAO)纳米光栅的薄膜硅太阳能电池表面减反结构.理论分析设计了AAO纳米光栅结构参数.用Tracepro光学软件研究了不同占空比和光栅常数对薄膜硅光吸收的影响,得到了最佳结构参数.在此基础上,运用FDTD软件进一步模拟了带有最佳AAO结构尺寸的太阳能电池吸收谱线.仿真结果表明在光栅常数为440 nm,光栅高度为75 nm,占空比为0.5结构尺寸下,AAO具有最强的加强光吸收的作用.     

Comparison of MOVPE grown GaAs solar cells using different substrates and group-V precursors

We have investigated the influence of substrate type (GaAs vs. germanium) and of group-V precursor (AsH₃ vs. TBAs) on the epitaxial quality of (In)(Al)GaAs layers. We evaluated these layers in terms of morphology, background contamination and doping characteristics. For final benchmarking of the individually optimised processes, we produced p-on-n single junction GaAs solar cells and compared their relative performance. This type of device is an excellent performance monitor for epitaxial layers as the fundamental operating mechanism is drift of minority carriers. The solar cell grown with TBAs on a germanium-substrate has a conversion efficiency under the AM1.5 solar spectrum, which compares favourably with the highest reported value for a p-on-n GaAs solar cell on Ge (Prog. Photovolt. Res. Appl. 8 (2000) 377).     

Inline deposited thin-film silicon solar cells on imprinted foil using linear PECVD sources

The standard way to improve the light management of thin film solar cells is to introduce a light scattering structure, either on the front window or at the back reflector. Usually, growth conditions of TCO layers are adjusted to get random surface roughness on the front window. In this paper we present an alternative method, which can be applied both on the front window and at the back reflector. It involves imprinting a UV curable coating layer allowing full control on the texture (random or periodic) to fully optimise the light trapping. Light trapping is even more important for microcrystalline Si solar cells. We have fabricated thin film nip Si solar cells with sputtered Ag/ZnO back contacts on embossed barrier layers on steel foil. We show that the UV curable coating is well-suited as imprintable barrier layer between the steel foil and the active layers. For nip a-Si cells we can obtain light trapping, as measured by the short-circuit current, that is almost as good as that of nip a-Si cells made on Asahi U-type glass, covered with a Ag/ZnO back reflector. Furthermore, we show that dynamically processed a-Si nip cells on foil realised efficiencies of over 7%, which are only slightly less than for cells made in a UHV lab-scale cluster tool in static processing. Finally, a-Si/a-Si tandems and μc-Si/a-Si tandems have been fabricated. Initial efficiencies of around 8% on textured barrier layer on steel foil have been achieved.     

Cross-contamination in single-chamber processes for thin-film silicon solar cells

Boron (B) and phosphorus (P) cross-contamination for single-chamber deposited a-Si:H, μc-Si:H, and a-Si:H/μc-Si:H tandem solar cells has been investigated by studying their impact on the different layers of solar cells. To reduce the B and P cross-contamination into the i-layer and p-layer, respectively, to a tolerable level, for a-Si:H and μc-Si:H cells a 15' evacuation cycle prior to the i-layer deposition is applied. The effect of P cross-contamination into the i-layer is strongly reduced by the p-layer deposition and a 15’ evacuation cycle prior to the i-layer deposition. The p-layer is assumed to cover up or to fix (in form of P-B complexes) most of the P at the chamber walls. This leads to high quality μc-Si:H cells and a-Si:H cells with only slightly reduced performance. Here, a soft-start of the a-Si:H i-layer led to high quality cells, presumably due to reduced P recycling. Further, there is no need to clean the process chamber with, e.g. NF₃, after each p-layer, as applied in many industrial processes. Instead, many cells are deposited without cleaning the process chamber. We established a single-chamber tandem cell process with 15' evacuation cycles prior to the μc-Si:H p-layer and to each i-layer with a cell efficiency of ~ 11.1%.     

Substrate engineering for high efficiency thin film solar cells

The design considerations for a spectra modifying, light scattering layer for amorphous silicon solar cells were investigated. Efficient commercially available phosphors absorb one near IR photon and one near UV photon and emit one photon in the visible spectrum. Thereby such phosphors offer the possibility to convert two poorly utilized portions of the solar spectrum to photons that are converted to electric energy with high quantum efficiency in amorphous silicon-based solar cells. Large band gap, conductive, a-SiC:H and a-SiN:H are attractive matrices for phosphors as scattered light and emitted photons are thereby directed towards the underlying solar cell structure.     

Electrodeposited and selenized CIGS thin films for solar cells

Cu(In,Ga)Se₂ polycrystalline thin films were deposited adopting the potentiostatic electrochemical method on Mo/soda lime glass substrate. All the as-deposited Cu(In,Ga)Se₂ thin films were annealed in a selenium atmosphere at 550 °C for 1 h to improve the film crystalline properties. The selenized CIGS thin films were characterized by energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM).The results indicate Cu(In,Ga)Se₂ thin films have single chalcopyrite structure and the grain size varies from 0.8 to 2.5 μm.     

Structure engineering of small molecules for organic solar cells

Abstract

Two 1,3-bis(thiophen-2-yl)?5,7-bis(2-ehtylhexyl)benzo-[1,2-c:4,5-c]-dithiophene-4,8-dione (BDD) based small molecules, SM1 and SM2 are designed and synthesized by incorporating benzodithiophene (BDT) central core, BDD dual accepting units and 3-ethyl rhodamine as endcap group with various number of BDT units. We systematically investigated the synthesis, optical and electrochemical properties, and photovoltaic characteristics of these donor materials. The number of BDT units have a significant influence on Jsc due to interconnected structure and results in a broader absorption on thin film. The inverted devices employed for both small molecules exhibited power conversion efficiencies of 0.41% for SM1 and 0.82% for SM2.     

Characterization of HF-PECVD a-Si:H thin film solar cells by using OES studies

Hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) films show considerable potential for the fabrication of thin film solar cells. In this study, the a-Si:H thin films have been deposited in a parallel-plate radio frequency (RF) plasma reactor fed with pure SiH₄. The plasma diagnostics were performed simultaneously during the a-Si:H solar cell deposition process using an optical emission spectrometer (OES) in order to study their correlations with growth rate and microstructure of the films. During the deposition, the emitting species (SiH*, Si*, H*) was analyzed. The effect of RF power on the emission intensities of excited SiH, Si and H on the film growth rate has been investigated. The OES analysis revealed a chemisorption-based deposition model of the growth mechanism. Finally, the a-Si:H thin film solar cell with an efficiency of 7.6% has been obtained.     

Improvement of efficiency of ITO/Se thin film solar cells using tellurium stimulator

Indium Tin Oxide ITO/Se thin film solar cells have been fabricated by vacuum deposition. Prior to deposition of selenium film, ultrathin tellurium film has been deposited on ITO thin film. Tellurium film acts as a stimulator for bringing improvement in crystallite size, adhesion to ITO and electrical behaviour of selenium thin films. The maximum efficiency of the ITO/Se thin film solar cells without tellurium stimulator and with tellurium stimulator under illumination AM1 (100 mW cm⁻²) are found to be 1.68% and 2.27% while under fluorescent tubelight (0.15 mW cm⁻²) are found to be 5.85% and 7.05% respectively. The ITO/Se thin film solar cells exhibits high spectral response at short wavelength. The barrier height of the ITO/Se thin film solar cells was determined.     

Micro-Raman mapping on layers for crystalline silicon thin-film solar cells

Micro-Raman mappings have been used for characterization of our layers system developed for thin-film silicon solar cells. For the cubic SiC barrier layer a preferential orientation of the grains in 〈1 1 1〉 direction normal to the substrate was revealed. A high density of stacking faults resulted in the splitting of transversal optical (TO)-phonon modes, usually only observed in several non-cubic SiC polytypes. Within the silicon layers, which were obtained by zone melting recrystallization (ZMR) and subsequent epitaxial growth, a high residual stress of about 625 MPa was measured near the boundary towards the SiC layer. Outside of this boundary no residual stress could be detected, in spite of commonly found twin boundaries. Thus the main origin of residual stress in the silicon layers is due to the different expansion coefficients of the respective layers, while grain boundaries have no dominant effect.     

Organic dyes incorporating 9,10-dihydrophenanthrene moiety for dye-sensitized solar cells

Abstract

A series of new dipolar organic dyes containing 9,10-dihydrophenanthrene has been synthesized as sensitizers for the application in dye-sensitized solar cells. These new materials containing less rigid π–linker as sensitizers exhibit good performance with conversion efficiencies ranging from 1.58% to 6.21% reaching 11?～?83% of the ruthenium dye N719-based cell under the same condition.