Moly-poly solar cells: Industrial application of metal-oxide passivating contacts

Ultra-thin SiOx and AIOx passivating layers for MoOx based selective hole contacts

Moly-polt solar cell: Industrial application of metal-oxide passivating contacts with a starting efficiency of 18.1%

We present large-area “moly-poly” cells, with a front side MoOx/a-Si:H(i) passivating contact and a rear-side poly-Si/SiOx stack, and we have demonstrated that MoOx based c-Si solar cell technology can be scaled to industrial wafer size. Excellent surface passivation was achieved using MoOx and poly-Si, leading to implied Voc values above 700 mV...

Electron beam evaporated molybdenum oxide as Hole-selective contact 6-inch c-Si Heterojunction solar cells

Electron beam (E-beam) deposited molybdenum oxide (MoOx) has been investigated for its potential to replace p-type hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) in Si heterojunction (SHJ) solar cells. Excellent passivation was achieved for our best MoOx/c-Si junction based device, reaching an average implied Voc (iVoc) of 734 mV on textured,...

High resolation THz scanning for optimization of dielectric layer opening process on doped Si surfaces

Diffused IBC solar cells based on non-fire-through (NFT) metallization can achieve higher performance with respect to FT metallization, thanks to lower contact resistance. Less resistive contacts allows for lower metal fraction and thus lower contact recombination. For the application of NFT contacts, the rear side dielectric passivation layer...

Enablers for IBC: integral cell and module development and implementation in PV industry

An integral solar cell and module concept is developed based on an IBC cell design with a front floating emitter (FFE). The FFE renders the cell resilient to electrical shading and reduces the demands on feature size. The cells are bi-facial by design. We interconnected 6” IBC cells using a conductive back sheet foil, resulting in a visually...

Emitter and contact optimization for high-efficiency IBC Mercury cells

In this paper we present the results of a study of the emitter contact properties of the Mercury cell, which is an n-type IBC cell with a front floating emitter. We found that contact recombination becomes higher and contact resistance becomes lower with higher firing temperature. Additionally, the contacts to light and heavy emitters were...

Designing IBC cells with FFE: Long range effects with circuit simulation

IBC cells with Front Floating Emitter (FFE) pose different design challenges compared to more conventional IBC cells with FSF (Front Surface Field). The FFE enables hole transport over distances that are large compared to the typical BSF or emitter width. The core of the cell design is commonly a device simulation in which, because of the...

High resolution sheet resistance mapping to unveil edge effects in industrial IBC solar cells

We present Terahertz (THz) transmission measurements with a spatial resolution of down to 10 ?ѭ as a new inspection technique for high-resolution sheet resistance (Rsh) measurements, that are well suited to quantify the local Rsh (n-type and p-type regions) of interdigitated back-contact (IBC) structures and to support further optimization of...

Mercury: Industrial IBC cell with front floating emitter for 20.9% and higher efficiency

This paper presents our recent progress in the development and characterization of our 6߿ݠindustrial IBC Mercury cells. We gained more than 1% absolute in efficiency by optimizing the processes and design of the cells, resulting in 20.9% cell efficiency. Our cell process does not create a space or gap߿ݠbetween the rear-side emitter and BSF areas...

A benchmarking study of the application of a Distributed Bragg Reflector as back-reflector on n-Pasha solar cells

A Distributed Bragg Reflector (DBR) optimized for textured substrates was applied as back-reflector to n-Pasha (bifacial) cells. The (infrared) light trapping performance was evaluated and compared to high quality back- reflectors (BRs, i.e. Ag, TiO2) and to a reflective white backsheet (in a single cell laminate). It was found that compared to...

Mercury: Industrial IBC cell with front floating emitter for 20.9% and higher efficiency

In this paper break-through results on our 6߿ݠindustrial Mercury cells are presented. We gained more than 1% absolute in efficiency by optimizing the processes and design of the cells, resulting in 20.9% cell efficiency. We used standard industrial equipment and the number of process steps similar to our commercial n-Pasha technology. The screen...

Mercury: Industrial IBC Cell with Front Floating Emitter For 20.9% and Higher Efficiency

This paper presents our recent progress in the development and characterization of our 6߿ݠindustrial IBC Mercury cells. We gained more than 1% absolute in efficiency by optimizing the processes and design of the cells, resulting in 20.9% cell efficiency. Our cell process does not create a space or gap߿ݠbetween the rear-side emitter and BSF areas...

Effect of EVA encapsulation on antireflection properties of Mie nanoscatterers for c-Si solar cells

Dielectric nanoparticle arrays have been proposed as antireflection coatings and light-trapping schemes for thin-film c- Si solar cells. However, practical aspects about the integration of these nanostructures with solar modules have yet to be investigated. In this paper, we study the effect of ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA) encapsulation on the...

Front-floating emitter voltage mapping of IBC Mercury cells

Standard characterization techniques such as LBIC are difficult to apply to IBC solar cells with a front floating emitter (FFE). This is because the cells need to be under bias illumination, and this is often impossible in commercial LBIC measurement tools. To the best of our knowledge, LBIC measurements on FFE IBC cells have not been published...

FFE IBC cells: impact of busbars on cell performance with circuit modelling

We show how to construct an equivalent circuit for our Mercury FFE IBC cells to model features beyond the unit cell efficiently, taking into account the lateral hole transport in the FFE. We show how its predictions can be correlated with voltage maps of the FFE voltage, and used for optimum design of for instance busbars. The highest efficiency...

Plasmonic light-trapping in a-Si:H solar cells by front-side Ag nanoparticle arrays: A benchmarking study

A series of (n-i-p) a-Si:H solar cells with light-trapping by front-side plasmonic Ag nonoparticle arrays was compared to a reference without the plasmonic arrays as well as to a benchmark with a conventional textured back-side reflector for light-trapping. The external quantum efficiency of the solar cells was determined experimentally by...