Improved anisotropic etching process for industrial texturing of silicon solar cells

Vázsonyi, É.; Clercq, Koen De; Einhaus, Roland; Kerschaver, Emmanuel Van; Said, Khalid; Poortmans, Jef; Szlufcik, Jozef; Nijs, Johan

doi:10.1016/s0927-0248(98)00180-9

Cited by 248 publications

(121 citation statements)

References 3 publications

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“…The formation of the pyramid can be attributed to the anisotropy etching rate between Si 〈001〉 and 〈111〉 directions. 19 Subsequently, the textured silicon wafer was sulfur ion implanted. The depth profile of sulfur ion inside the textured silicon wafer can be simulated by SRIM software, 20 as shown in Fig.…”

Section: Preparation Of Sulfur Hyperdoped Silicon Samplesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Optical and electrical properties of textured sulfur-hyperdoped silicon: a thermal annealing study

Wang

Liu

et al. 2015

J Mater Sci

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When the sulfur element is hyperdoped into crystalline silicon to a supersaturated density of ~10 20 cm -3 , it can enhance the sub-bandgap light absorption of silicon from 0 to 70%, with the antireflection of surface dome structures. On the other hand, the local Si: S configuration that can contribute to the strong sub-bandgap absorption is still unknown. In order to find more characteristics of this local Si:S configuration, we thermally annealed the textured sulfur hyperdoped silicon, and analyzed the changes of its optical and electrical properties. We find that the imaginary part ( 2 ) of the complex dielectric constant of this Si:S configuration is almost constant in the wavelength range from 1250 nm to 2500 nm, and it decreases quickly when thermally annealed at the a) E-mail: qsc@semi.ac.cn b) E-mail: wangyx@henu.edu.cn 2 temperature range from 400℃ to 700℃. To consider the annealing process as a decomposition reaction of this local Si:S configuration, we obtain the thermal activation energy of attenuated infrared light absorption is 0.356eV for this Si:S configuration transforming from optically active state to be inactive state. Hall measurements demonstrate that thermal annealing can convert this local Si:S configuration from electrically active state to inactive state-namely, to lower the electron density and meanwhile enlarge the electron mobility. These experimental results will be very helpful to clarify the local Si:S configuration that can absorb strongly the light at the silicon sub-bandgap wavelength.

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Section: Preparation Of Sulfur Hyperdoped Silicon Samplesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Optical and electrical properties of textured sulfur-hyperdoped silicon: a thermal annealing study

Wang

Liu

et al. 2015

J Mater Sci

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“…8 These mixtures are generally based on solutions containing hydrofluoric acid and nitric acid. Various additives, such as CH 3 COOH, H 3 PO 4 , H 2 SO 4 , or HCl influence the reactivity toward silicon, surface morphologies, and the cleaning efficiency. [9][10][11][12] The dissolution of silicon in hydrofluoric acid-based mixtures is basically described as a process of two subsequent steps.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

On The Mechanism of the Anisotropic Dissolution of Silicon in Chlorine Containing Hydrofluoric Acid Solutions

Stapf

Nattrodt

Kroke

2017

J. Electrochem. Soc.

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The wet-chemical acidic treatment of silicon wafer surfaces is very important in photovoltaic, microelectronic and further industries. Recent works report on new mixtures for acidic anisotropic etching mixtures based on hydrofluoric acid HF and hydrochloric acid HCl with an added oxidant. The aim of this work was to get an insight into the reactions during the etching process of silicon in the system HF-HCl-Cl 2 . The etching mixtures, gaseous reaction products, as well as the generated silicon surfaces were investigated by 19 F, 29 Si, and 35 Cl NMR, ion chromatography (IC), iodometric titration, FT-IR spectroscopy, diffuse reflectance FT-IR spectroscopy (DRIFT) as well as scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (SEM-EDX). A reaction scheme for the anisotropic dissolution of silicon in chlorine containing aqueous HF-solutions is proposed, which involves dissolved Cl 2 as the oxidizing agent, coordination of fluoride/chloride ions and formation of a hydrophilic surface. These steps are similar to the well known alkaline anisotropic etching of silicon.

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“…Textured surfaces have an advantage of a light-trapping due to their reduced reection and increased optical path length in reection or absorption. The solar cells can be textured using a photolithographic technique [9], chemical and electrochemical etching [10,11] and reactive ion etching (RIE) [12,13].…”

Section: Reduction Of the Optical Losses Inmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reduction of the Optical Losses in CdTe/ZnTe Thin-Film Solar Cells

et al. 2014

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We report on reduction of optical losses in n-CdTe/p-ZnTe thin-lm solar cells grown by molecular beam epitaxy. The investigated thin-lm devices were grown from elemental sources on monocrystalline, semi-insulating, (100)-oriented GaAs substrates. The optical losses have been reduced by a texturing of the device surface and by depositing of a ZnO antireection coating. Currentvoltage and spectral characteristics of the investigated p-ZnTe/n-CdTe solar cells depend signicantly on the preparation of the surface of the ZnTe window. We describe a procedure of chemical etching of the ZnTe window leading to surface texturing. A ZnO layer of proper thickness deposited by low-temperature atomic layer deposition technique on the ZnTe surface forms an eective antireection coating that leads to the reduction of optical losses. Due to reduction of the optical losses we observe increase of the short-circuit current, JSC, by almost 60% and of the energy conversion eciency by 44%.

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Improved anisotropic etching process for industrial texturing of silicon solar cells

Cited by 248 publications

References 3 publications

Optical and electrical properties of textured sulfur-hyperdoped silicon: a thermal annealing study

Optical and electrical properties of textured sulfur-hyperdoped silicon: a thermal annealing study

On The Mechanism of the Anisotropic Dissolution of Silicon in Chlorine Containing Hydrofluoric Acid Solutions

Reduction of the Optical Losses in CdTe/ZnTe Thin-Film Solar Cells

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