On the mechanism of the vapor etching of diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers for texturing

Geng, Guoying; Wei, Xiuqin; Yue, Zhihao; Zhou, Lang

doi:10.1016/j.mssp.2016.05.017

Cited by 12 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…To compare the VE-generated surface morphology at different bath temperatures, a relatively long etching time, 10 min, was adopted for stabilizing the morphology. Our recent work [5] showed that the morphology evolved greatly before 4 min, and became relatively stable afterwards. For VE at different bath temperatures, this tuning point of time may vary.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 97%

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Morphology of etch-pits on HF-HNO₃-H₂O vapor-etched diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers

Geng

Wei

Yue

et al. 2016

Semicond. Sci. Technol.

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We have experimented with vapor-etching texturization of diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers, with the vapor from the thermal evaporation of a HF-HNO 3 -H 2 O solution, focusing on the effect of the solution temperature on the surface morphology. The average depth of removal in etching, light reflectivity and surface profile are tracked as well. Three regimes of the solution temperatures are identified. They are featured by weak etching, shallow etch-pits forming and deep dual-scale etch-pits forming, from the range of low, medium to high solution temperatures, respectively. Light reflectivity on the textured surface with the dual-scale etch-pits can be reduced to 14%. It is proposed that the etching reaction is actually caused by liquid droplets condensed from the vapor, rather than by the vapor itself. This may explain the localized etching leading to deep etch-pits, the temperature effects and the formation of the texture with dual-scale etch-pits, in the present vapor etching.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…Recently, we investigated the evolution of the topography of multi-crystalline silicon in the VE at a certain bath temperature. A micro-droplet erosion-dominated VEetching mechanism has been identified [5]. In the present work, we further investigated the morphology of etch-pits generated by VE at different bath temperatures.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 90%

Morphology of etch-pits on HF-HNO₃-H₂O vapor-etched diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers

Geng

Wei

Yue

et al. 2016

Semicond. Sci. Technol.

Self Cite

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“…To confirm the etching influence of acid vapor and reacted vapor, we conducted small-scale experiments according to the previous workfor P-type mc-Si wafers (2 * 2 cm). 10 The schematic diagram of VTE experiments is illustrated in Figure 1A. Firstly, the etching solution was prepared by mixing HF and HNO 3 with a volume ratio of 7:3.…”

Section: Small-scale Experimentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Green scalable vapor texture etching for multicrystalline silicon wafers

Sun

Tsai

Liang

et al. 2020

Progress in Photovoltaics

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In recent years, the low‐cost diamond‐wire (DW) slicing has been widely used for single‐crystalline silicon (sc‐Si) wafers, and this makes sc‐Si solar cells very attractive to the market. On the contrary, the adoption of DW slicing for multicrystalline (mc‐Si) wafers is troublesome because of poor texturing quality in the existing production lines using acid solutions. We have developed a vapor texture etching (VTE) process with the combination of both acid and reacted vapors for DW sliced mc‐Si wafers. The etching process was rather simple and low cost. More importantly, the acid usage was low and recyclable, so that the acid emission was low as well. Its scale‐up was easy and straightforward. In this lab‐scale reactor, more than 50 full‐size wafers could be processed each time. The etched wafers had uniform appearance and low reflectivity, around 10%. After the nanostructure pores were enlarged by post treatments to minimize surface recombination, the full‐size mc‐Si solar cell fabricated by Solartech could achieve an efficiency of 19.7% using the Passivated Emitter and Rear Contact (PERC) structure, which was comparable with the average production efficiency.

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An Innovative Light Trapping Structure Fabrication Method on Diamond‐Wire‐Sawing Multi‐Crystalline Silicon Wafers

et al. 2018

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An innovative fabrication method of light trapping structures on the surface of diamond‐wire‐sawing multi‐crystalline silicon (DWS mc‐Si) is proposed, which may trigger new progress in photovoltaic (PV) industry. A simple pre‐etching step with HNO3/HF solution is used to remove the saw marks of the wafers as well as amorphous silicon layers, and form vermicular micro‐hollows. Then, the HNO3/HF fog formed by ultrasonic vibration etches the silicon surface to fabricate nano‐scale porous structures on the above microstructures. This micro‐nano composite structure (MNCS) surface shows low average light reflectivity (∼5.5%) and relatively higher effective minority carrier lifetime (∼5.2 μs). The innovative method is applied to fabricate the 156 mm × 156 mm DWS mc‐Si solar cells and the conversion efficiency of 18.01% has been obtained, which is 0.93% higher than the cells without MNCS. This method matches well with current PV industrial processes, which shows a promising prospect.

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On the mechanism of the vapor etching of diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers for texturing

Cited by 12 publications

References 9 publications

Morphology of etch-pits on HF-HNO₃-H₂O vapor-etched diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers

Morphology of etch-pits on HF-HNO₃-H₂O vapor-etched diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers

Green scalable vapor texture etching for multicrystalline silicon wafers

An Innovative Light Trapping Structure Fabrication Method on Diamond‐Wire‐Sawing Multi‐Crystalline Silicon Wafers

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On the mechanism of the vapor etching of diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers for texturing

Cited by 12 publications

References 9 publications

Morphology of etch-pits on HF-HNO3-H2O vapor-etched diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers

Morphology of etch-pits on HF-HNO3-H2O vapor-etched diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers

Green scalable vapor texture etching for multicrystalline silicon wafers

An Innovative Light Trapping Structure Fabrication Method on Diamond‐Wire‐Sawing Multi‐Crystalline Silicon Wafers

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Product

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Morphology of etch-pits on HF-HNO₃-H₂O vapor-etched diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers

Morphology of etch-pits on HF-HNO₃-H₂O vapor-etched diamond wire sawn multi-crystalline silicon wafers