The development of a polycrystalline thin-film solar cell utilizing a backwall designed heterojunction structure based upon p-type Cu2−xSe and n-type CdS semiconductor materials is described. The electrical, optical, and structural properties of the deposited thin-film materials are described. A device efficiency of 5.38% under simulated AM1 illumination is reported.

The oxidation of p-type single-crystal and thin-film polycrystalline CuInSe2 is investigated using complementary Auger electron spectroscopy (AES), secondary ion mass spectroscopy (SIMS) and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The compositions of the thermally-grown oxides over the 150 °–300 °C temperature range are found to be primarily In2O3, with some SeO2, estimated to be less than 10% by quantitative AES and XPS. The interface between the oxide and CuInSe2 is examined using AES and SIMS depth-compositional profiling in conjunction with XPS. CuxSe is found to form at the interface. Angular-resolved XPS with an in situ oxidation process is utilized to evaluate the initial oxidation of this Cu-ternary semiconductor. These studies confirm that CuxSe forms during oxide growth.

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A polycrystalline thin-film Cds/CuInSe2 heterojunction solar cell with an efficiency of 5.7% has been prepared using a simultaneous elemental evaporation technique to deposit the CuInSe2 film. The cell–s short(-circuit current of 31 mA/cm2 under 100 mW/cm2 is the highest ever reported for a 1-cm2 cell. Heat treatments have been found to improve cell efficiency and to also change the cell I-V and C-V characteristics.

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