Inkjet‐ and FlexTrail‐Printing with Low Silver Consumption for Silicon Heterojunction Solar Cells

Schube, Jörg; Fellmeth, Tobias; Jahn, Mike; Keding, Roman; Glunz, Stefan W.

doi:10.1002/pssr.201900186

Cited by 16 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 5 publications

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“…[25] This has been considered in previous FlexTrail-related publications by correction analysis. [22,24] It is the goal of current work to demonstrate an increase of FlexTrail-printed fingers' height by keeping finger width as low as possible and to evaluate such metallization on the front side of SHJ solar cells. For this purpose, the silver loading of the printing medium has been increased from 50% wt to 87% wt in collaboration with an external partner.…”

Section: Flextrail Printingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In previous publications, SHJ solar cells’ front metal contacts with feature sizes of (16.0 ± 1.0) μm have been presented using an ink with 50% wt silver loading. [ 22,24 ] However, the height of FlexTrail‐printed contact fingers was determined to be in the range of 0.2 μm only. This results in resistive losses of the solar cell and, additionally, can lead to fill factor (FF) overestimations in solar cell IV‐measurements.…”

Section: Flextrail Printingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…[ 25 ] This has been considered in previous FlexTrail‐related publications by correction analysis. [ 22,24 ]…”

Section: Flextrail Printingmentioning

confidence: 99%

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FlexTrail Printing as Direct Metallization with Low Silver Consumption for Silicon Heterojunction Solar Cells: Evaluation of Solar Cell and Module Performance

et al. 2022

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FlexTrail printing has been invented and developed for (fine‐line) printing of various fluids, e.g., particle‐based metal‐containing fluids, etchants, and liquid‐phase pyrophoric media. Compared to other printing techniques, FlexTrail is highly independent of the fluids’ viscosity. Using this printing approach, feature sizes of 10 μm and below are reached. This work utilizes FlexTrail as a direct metallization method for printing of silver‐nanoparticle‐based front electrodes on busbarless silicon heterojunction (SHJ) solar cells. Thereby, only (9.4 ± 0.9) mg of silver is consumed for printing of a busbarless front grid, which exhibits 80 contact fingers of 156 mm in length. This means a silver reduction of more than 60% compared to screen printing. Solar cells with M2+ wafer size and FlexTrail‐printed front grids reach conversion efficiencies of up to (22.87 ± 0.01)%, which is similar to screen‐printed reference cells. To further demonstrate the practicability of FlexTrail metallization beyond cell level, a FlexTrail‐printed SHJ cell is further processed into a 200 mm × 200 mm‐sized one‐cell module applying SmartWire Connection Technology for interconnection. This module exhibits a maximum power of (5.0 ± 0.1) W, underlining the great potential of FlexTrail printing for the metallization of high‐power SHJ devices with significant silver reduction.

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Section: Flextrail Printingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Flextrail Printingmentioning

confidence: 99%

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FlexTrail Printing as Direct Metallization with Low Silver Consumption for Silicon Heterojunction Solar Cells: Evaluation of Solar Cell and Module Performance

et al. 2022

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“…One such application is Ag‐coated Cu paste, [ 18 ] particularly for HJT cells. [ 10 ] By using a coated Ag on Cu particles, the Ag usage can be reduced by 30–50%. A more exciting alternative would be to use a Cu paste that is free of Ag.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A rotary screen printing method developed by Lorenz et al [9] has short printing cycles and a low Ag consumption of about 6-9 mg W À1 . Schube et al [10] reported a novel metallization technology called FlexTrail-printing, and very low Ag consumption 0.05 mg W À1 has been achieved by using Ag nanoparticle ink. The use of dispensing equipment has also been developed for the metallization of solar cells, [11] with 0.54 mg per Ag finger being reported.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Thermal Stable High‐Efficiency Copper Screen Printed Back Contact Solar Cells

et al. 2022

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The high usage of silver in industrial solar cells may limit the growth of the solar industry. One solution is to replace Ag with copper. A screen printable Cu paste is used herein to metallize industrial interdigitated back contact (IBC) solar cells. A novel metallization structure is proposed for making solar cells. Cu paste is applied to replace the majority of the Ag used in IBC cells as busbars and fingers. Cu paste is evaluated for use as fingers, and solar cells are made to test conversion efficiency and reliability. The Cu paste achieves comparably low resistivity, and Cu paste printed cells demonstrate similar efficiency to Ag paste printed cells, with an average efficiency of 23%, and only 4.5 mg W−1 of Ag usage. Also, the solar cells are stable and no Cu in‐diffusion is observed under damp heat (85 °C, 85% relative humidity) and thermal stress (200 °C) for 1000 h, respectively. All processes used in this study can be carried out with industrial equipment. These findings reveal a new application for Cu pastes and point to a new direction for reducing Ag utilization and cost.

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3D Printing Technology Toward State‐Of‐The‐Art Photoelectric Devices

Zhang

Chang

et al. 2022

Adv Materials Technologies

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Photoelectric devices and components, as indispensable and increasingly significant technologies, are widely applied in energy conversion, electrocommunication, environmental detection, and so on. The rapid and accurate fabrication of optoelectronic devices and components brings severe challenges to the traditional preparation approaches. As a revolutionary emerging technology, 3D printing has unique advantages in geometric shape design and rapid prototyping in comparison with traditional manufacturing methods. Furthermore, it possesses excellent flexibility for fabrication methods and materials. To satisfy the fast‐expanding market of optoelectronic devices, the research in this field is showing an explosion of growth for 3D printing. However, systematic analysis and summary are still bleak about 3D printing in the photoelectric field despite abundant individual reports being presented. In order to point out its development status and forecast the future research direction, the relevant reports are summarized. Four categories of photoelectric devices are chosen as representative, including solar concentrators, solar cells, light emitting diodes, and photodetectors. In this article, the development and latest progress of 3D printing photoelectric devices are summarized as well as critical analyses of the challenges and opportunities are presented.

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Inkjet‐ and FlexTrail‐Printing with Low Silver Consumption for Silicon Heterojunction Solar Cells

Cited by 16 publications

References 5 publications

FlexTrail Printing as Direct Metallization with Low Silver Consumption for Silicon Heterojunction Solar Cells: Evaluation of Solar Cell and Module Performance

FlexTrail Printing as Direct Metallization with Low Silver Consumption for Silicon Heterojunction Solar Cells: Evaluation of Solar Cell and Module Performance

Thermal Stable High‐Efficiency Copper Screen Printed Back Contact Solar Cells

3D Printing Technology Toward State‐Of‐The‐Art Photoelectric Devices

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