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Uniformity and Quality of Monocrystalline Silicon Passivation by Thin Intrinsic Amorphous Silicon in a New Generation Plasma-enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition Reactor

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 February 2011

Benjamin Strahm ,
Yoann Andrault ,
Derk Bäetzner ,
Damien Lachenal ,
Chloé Guérin ,
Manuela Kobas ,
Joachim Mai ,
Bruno Mendes ,
Thomas Schulze  and
Guillaume Wahli
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Benjamin Strahm
Affiliation:
[email protected], Roth und Rau Switzerland SA, Neuchatel, Switzerland
Yoann Andrault
Affiliation:
[email protected], Roth und Rau Switzerland SA, Neuchatel, Switzerland
Derk Bäetzner
Affiliation:
[email protected], Roth und Rau Switzerland SA, Neuchatel, Switzerland
Damien Lachenal
Affiliation:
[email protected], Roth und Rau Switzerland SA, Neuchatel, Switzerland
Chloé Guérin
Affiliation:
[email protected], Roth und Rau Switzerland SA, Neuchatel, Switzerland
Manuela Kobas
Affiliation:
[email protected], Roth und Rau Switzerland SA, Neuchatel, Switzerland
Joachim Mai
Affiliation:
[email protected], Roth und Rau AG, Hohenstein-Ernstthal, Germany
Bruno Mendes
Affiliation:
[email protected], Roth und Rau Switzerland SA, Neuchatel, Switzerland
Thomas Schulze
Affiliation:
[email protected], Roth und Rau AG, Hohenstein-Ernstthal, Germany
Guillaume Wahli
Affiliation:
[email protected], Roth und Rau Switzerland SA, Neuchatel, Switzerland
Arthur Buechel
Affiliation:
[email protected], Roth und Rau Switzerland SA, Neuchatel, Switzerland
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Abstract

This work reports the first results of a new generation plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) reactor manufactured by Roth and Rau. This large area parallel plate reactor has been especially designed for the manufacturing of silicon heterojunction solar cells which are made of very thin amorphous silicon films over monocrystalline silicon substrates. Layer thickness uniformity below ± 3 % is reported for both intrinsic and doped layer over a 400 × 400 mm2 area. Moreover, it is shown that the passivation quality is excellent with life-times up to 4.15 ms on n-type FZ silicon substrates. A ± 0.6 % uniformity in open circuit voltage (mean value of 701.4 mV) is achieved over 32 devices having a 4 cm2 area and an average conversion efficiency of 19.5 %.

Keywords

plasma-enhanced CVD (PECVD) (deposition)thin filmphotovoltaic
Type
Research Article
Information
MRS Online Proceedings Library (OPL) , Volume 1245: Symposium A – Amorphous and Polycrystalline Thin-Film Silicon Science and Technology-2010 , 2010 , 1245-A01-04
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 2010

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References

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