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“Micromorph” tandem solar cells at high deposition rates

J. K. RATH1,*

Affiliation

  1. Utrecht University, SID-Physics of Devices, P.O. Box: 80000, 3508 TA Utrecht, The Netherlands

Abstract

In this paper, three aspects that are necessary for the successful fabrication of μc-Si cells at high deposition rates are dealt with; (i) innovative growth processes such as deposition by plasma CVD at very high frequencies and high pressure depletion (HPD) conditions (ii) in-situ gas phase as well as growth diagnosis and (iii) cell engineering. The paper also describes various new concepts such as the application of an external DC bias to the cathode and application of a nonlinear grading during deposition, that would among others reduce the ion energy and improve the structure of the film respectively. The light induced degradation characteristics of the μc-Si cells in comparison to a-Si and proto-Si are discussed. The recent developments of single junction μc-Si solar cells and micromorph tandem cells at Utrecht University, such as world’s highest stabilized efficiency of 10% at a deposition rate of 0.5nm/s, an efficiency of 6.7% at 5nm/s for μc-Si and 11.4% (12% initial) for micromorph cells made in a superstrate configuration are presented. Whereas the μc-Si showed improvement with light soaking, the tandems suffered only a 5% loss in efficiency..

Keywords

Thin films, Electrical properties, Computer simulation, Guinness.

Submitted at: Nov. 28, 2006
Accepted at: Jan. 15, 2007

Citation

J. K. RATH, “Micromorph” tandem solar cells at high deposition rates, Journal of Optoelectronics and Advanced Materials Vol. 9, Iss. 1, pp. 106-113 (2007)