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Optical developments for silicon thin film solar cells in the substrate configuration

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 February 2011

Thomas Soderstrom ,
Franz-Joseph Haug ,
Xavier Niquille ,
Oscar Cubero ,
Stéphanie Perregaux  and
Christophe Ballif
Thomas Soderstrom
Affiliation:
[email protected], IMT/UNINE, PV-LAB, Breguet 2, Neuchâtel, 2000, Switzerland, +41327183371
Franz-Joseph Haug
Affiliation:
[email protected], IMT/UNINE, Rue A.-L. Breguet 2, Neuchâtel, 2000, Switzerland
Xavier Niquille
Affiliation:
[email protected], IMT/UNINE, Rue A.-L. Breguet 2, Neuchâtel, 2000, Switzerland
Oscar Cubero
Affiliation:
[email protected], IMT/UNINE, Rue A.-L. Breguet 2, Neuchâtel, 2000, Switzerland
Stéphanie Perregaux
Affiliation:
[email protected], IMT/UNINE, Rue A.-L. Breguet 2, Neuchâtel, 2000, Switzerland
Christophe Ballif
Affiliation:
[email protected], IMT/UNINE, Rue A.-L. Breguet 2, Neuchâtel, 2000, Switzerland
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Abstract

In the nip or substrate configuration thin film silicon solar cells, the choice of front TCO contact is critical because there is a trade off between its transparency which influences the current in the solar cell and its conductivity which influences the series resistance. Here, we investigate the optical behavior of two different TCO front contacts, either a 70 nm thick, nominally flat ITO or a 2 μm thick rough LPCVD ZnO. The back contact consists of LP-CVD ZnO with random texture. First we investigate the influence of the rough and flat front TCOs in μc-Si:H and a-Si:H solar cells. With the back contact geometries used in this work, the antireflection properties of ITO are effective at providing as much light trapping as the rough LP-CVD ZnO. In the second part, we demonstrate that total of 25 to 26 mA/cm2is achievable in nip micromorph tandem cells and show short circuit current up to 11.7 mA/cm2 using an SIO based intermediate reflector.

Keywords

photovoltaicthin filmamorphous
Type
Research Article
Information
MRS Online Proceedings Library (OPL) , Volume 1101: Symposium KK – Light Management in Photovoltaic Devices–Theory and Practice , 2008 , 1101-KK04-05
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 2008

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