Improved performance of a crystalline silicon solar cell based on ZnO/PS anti-reflection coating layers

A porous silicon (PS) layer was prepared by photoelectrochemical etching (PECE), and a zinc oxide (ZnO) film was deposited on a PS layer using a radio frequency (RF) sputtering system. The surface morphology of the PS and ZnO/PS layers was characterised using scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Nano-pores were produced in the PS layer with an average diameter of 5.7 nm, which increased the porosity to 91%. X-ray diffraction (XRD) of the ZnO/PS layers shows that the ZnO film is highly oriented along the c-axis perpendicular to the PS layer. The average crystallite size of the PS and ZnO/PS layers are 17.06 and 17.94 nm, respectively. The photoluminescence (PL) emission spectra of the ZnO/PS layers present three emission peaks, two peaks located at 387.5 and 605 nm due to the ZnO nanocrystalline film and a third located at 637.5 nm due to nanocrystalline PS. Raman measurements of the ZnO/PS layers were performed at room temperature (RT) and indicate that a high-quality ZnO nanocrystalline film was formed. Optical reflectance for all the layers was obtained using an optical reflectometer. The lowest effective reflectance was obtained for the ZnO/PS layers. The fabrication of crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar cells based on the ZnO/PS anti-reflection coating (ARC) layers was performed. The I–V characteristics of the solar cells were studied under 100 mW/cm² illumination conditions. The ZnO/PS layers were found to be an excellent ARC and to exhibit exceptional light-trapping at wavelengths ranging from 400 to 1000 nm, which led to a high efficiency of the c-Si solar cell of 18.15%. The ZnO/PS ARC layers enhance and increase the efficiency of the c-Si solar cell. In this paper, the fabrication processes of the c-Si solar cell with ZnO/PS ARC layers are an attractive and promising technique to produce high-efficiency and low-cost of c-Si solar cells.