Low concentrator hetero-junction microcrystalline silicon solar cells

A review of concentrator silicon solar cells

“…Kasashima et al used a heterojunction microcrystalline silicon (μc-Si:H) thin film cell which was made by plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) for concentration, they deposited wide bandgap microcrystalline silicon oxide (μc-Si 1 À x O x :H) film as the top P-type layer to decrease the recombination of carriers, the efficiency of the cell reached 10.4% under 11.8 suns [98]. They also used two-junction and three-junction cells made of a-Si:H and μc-Si:H films for concentration, the current mismatch between the sub-cells increased with concentration ratio, the two-junction cell had the highest efficiency of 12.2% under 2.7 suns [99].…”

“…They also used two-junction and three-junction cells made of a-Si:H and μc-Si:H films for concentration, the current mismatch between the sub-cells increased with concentration ratio, the two-junction cell had the highest efficiency of 12.2% under 2.7 suns [99]. They also did numerical analysis to above cells using the AMPS-1D (Analysis of Microelectronic and Photonic Structures) software and found that the efficiencies of single-junction and three-junction cells could reach 13% and 23% under 50 suns after optimization [98,99]. However, the light-induced recession of the thin film cells will be more serious under concentration, the fill factor and efficiency of the cell decreased quickly with the increase of illumination time under 10 suns [100].…”