A new concept for mass production of large area thin-film silicon solar cells on glass

Rech, Bernd; Repmann, T.; Wieder, S.; Ruske, M.; Stephan, U.

doi:10.1016/j.tsf.2005.07.307

Cited by 37 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…9 Moreover, ZnO is chemically and thermally stable in hydrogen-containing plasmas, which are employed, in the presence of SiH 4 gas, for the deposition of silicon-based thin film p-i-n junctions. [10][11][12][13] Therefore, impurity-doped ZnO, e.g., ZnO:Al, is considered to be an attractive candidate to replace ITO. 8 There are several deposition techniques applied to synthesize ZnO, such as sol-gel, 14 spray pyrolisis, 15 magnetron sputtering, [16][17][18] pulsed laser deposition, 19,20 atomic layer deposition, 21,22 and metalorganic chemical vapor deposition (MO-CVD).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Controlling the resistivity gradient in aluminum-doped zinc oxide grown by plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition

Ponomarev

Verheijen

Keuning

et al. 2012

Journal of Applied Physics

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Document VersionPublisher's PDF, also known as Version of Record (includes final page, issue and volume numbers) Please check the document version of this publication:• A submitted manuscript is the author's version of the article upon submission and before peer-review. There can be important differences between the submitted version and the official published version of record. People interested in the research are advised to contact the author for the final version of the publication, or visit the DOI to the publisher's website.• The final author version and the galley proof are versions of the publication after peer review.• The final published version features the final layout of the paper including the volume, issue and page numbers. Link to publication Citation for published version (APA):Ponomarev, M., Verheijen, M. A., Keuning, W., Sanden, van de, M. C. M., & Creatore, M. (2012). Controlling the resistivity gradient in aluminum-doped zinc oxide grown by plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition. Journal of Applied Physics, 112(4), 043708-1/7. [043708]. DOI: 10.1063/1.4747942 General rightsCopyright and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the public portal are retained by the authors and/or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights.• Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research.• You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain • You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal ? Take down policyIf you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. Aluminum-doped ZnO (ZnO:Al) grown by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) generally exhibit a major drawback, i.e., a gradient in resistivity extending over a large range of film thickness. The present contribution addresses the plasma-enhanced CVD deposition of ZnO:Al layers by focusing on the control of the resistivity gradient and providing the solution towards thin ( 300 nm) ZnO:Al layers, exhibiting a resistivity value as low as 4 Â 10 À4 X cm. The approach chosen in this work is to enable the development of several ZnO:Al crystal orientations at the initial stages of the CVD-growth, which allow the formation of a densely packed structure exhibiting a grain size of 60-80 nm for a film thickness of 95 nm. By providing an insight into the growth of ZnO:Al layers, the present study allows exploring their application into several solar cell technologies. Highly conducting (doped) ZnO thin films are being used in diverse applications, such as light-emitting 1 and laser diodes, 2 architectural and automotive glazing, 3 thin-film transistors, 4,5 and high efficiency thin-film solar cells. 6 This latter makes use of ZnO as transparent conducting oxide (TCO), whe...

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Controlling the resistivity gradient in aluminum-doped zinc oxide grown by plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition

Ponomarev

Verheijen

Keuning

et al. 2012

Journal of Applied Physics

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“…16,17 Thus, a stack consisting of a thin amorphous silicon top cell and a microcrystalline bottom cell in a so-called micromorph tandem structure offers the potential for fairly high efficiency at low cost in mass production. [18][19][20][21] A stabilized efficiency of 12.0% has recently been published for a tandem structure module 22 ͑for comparison, solar modules with sliced single crystalline and polycrystalline silicon have been reported to show efficiencies of up to 22.7% and 15.3%, respectively 23 ͒. Even though silicon thin-film modules still show rather low efficiencies compared to the other approaches, from the application point of view the annual energy production and especially the cost per unit of annual energy production is much more relevant.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The effect of front ZnO:Al surface texture and optical transparency on efficient light trapping in silicon thin-film solar cells

Berginski

Hüpkes

Schulte

et al. 2007

Journal of Applied Physics

488

275

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This study addresses the material properties of magnetron-sputtered aluminum-doped zinc oxide (ZnO:Al) films and their application as front contacts in silicon thin-film solar cells. Optimized films exhibit high conductivity and transparency, as well as a surface topography with adapted light-scattering properties to induce efficient light trapping in silicon thin-film solar cells. We investigated the influence on the ZnO:Al properties of the amount of alumina in the target as well as the substrate temperature during sputter deposition. The alumina content in the target influences the carrier concentration leading to different conductivity and free carrier absorption in the near infrared. Additionally, a distinct influence on the film growth of the ZnO:Al layer was found. The latter affects the surface topography which develops during wet-chemical etching in diluted hydrochloric acid. Depending on alumina content in the target and heater temperature, three different regimes of etching behavior have been identified. Low amounts of target doping and low heater temperatures result in small and irregular features in the postetching surface topography, which does not scatter the light efficiently. At higher substrate temperatures and target doping levels, more regularly distributed craters evolve with mean opening angles between 120° and 135° and lateral sizes of 1–3μm. These layers are very effective in light scattering. In the third regime—at very high substrate temperatures and high doping levels—the postetching surface is rather flat and almost no light scattering is observed. We applied the ZnO:Al films as front contacts in thin-film silicon solar cells to study their light-trapping ability. While high transparency is a prerequisite, light trapping was improved by using front contacts with a surface topography consisting of relatively uniformly dispersed craters. We have identified a low amount of target doping (0.5–1wt%) and relatively high substrate temperatures (about 350–450°C as sputter parameters enabling short-circuit current densities as high as 26.8mA∕cm2 in μc-Si:H pin cells with an i-layer thickness of 1.9μm. Limitations on further improvements of light-trapping ability are discussed in comparison with the theoretical limitations and Monte Carlo simulations presented in the literature.

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“…In spite of the promising gas utilization efficiency of pure silane processes [8], up to now mc-Si:H deposition over large areas has been investigated only for the conventional hydrogen-diluted regime [12,13], and a pure silane process has never been tested in systems larger than small laboratory reactors. Even in these small reactors, the highest deposition rate recorded is less than 10 A=s although higher deposition rates of solar grade material have been demonstrated in the case of the hydrogen-diluted regime [14][15][16].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Microcrystalline silicon deposited at high rate on large areas from pure silane with efficient gas utilization

Strahm

Howling

Sansonnens

et al. 2007

Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells

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A new concept for mass production of large area thin-film silicon solar cells on glass

Cited by 37 publications

References 12 publications

Controlling the resistivity gradient in aluminum-doped zinc oxide grown by plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition

Controlling the resistivity gradient in aluminum-doped zinc oxide grown by plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition

The effect of front ZnO:Al surface texture and optical transparency on efficient light trapping in silicon thin-film solar cells

Microcrystalline silicon deposited at high rate on large areas from pure silane with efficient gas utilization

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