Influence of surface texturization on the light trapping and spectral response of silicon solar cells

Saha, Hiranmay; Datta, Swapan K.; Mukhopadhyay, K.; Banerjee, Sonali; Mukherjee, M. K.

doi:10.1109/16.129089

Cited by 33 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 5 publications

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“…The pyramidal texturing increases the number of light-surface interactions, as sketched in Figure 1a, thereby increasing conversion efficiency. 4 Pyramidal texturing is predicted to increase the efficiency of silicon solar cells by up to 70%, 5 and efficiency gains of 12% have been demonstrated. 6 Nevertheless, the process suffers from irreproducibility and unpredictable time-dependent changes.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Molecular Mechanism of Etching-Induced Faceting on Si(100): Micromasking Is Not a Prerequisite for Pyramidal Texturing

Skibinski

Hines

2014

J. Phys. Chem. C

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Chemical control of crystalline surfaces during etching or growth finds application in a wide variety of areas, including the low-cost texturing of silicon solar cells to reduce reflectivity losses. Nevertheless, the kinetic processes that govern these morphological transformations are poorly understood. Here, we study the spontaneous nanoscale faceting of Si(100) surfaces during reaction with deoxygenated H 2 O using a combination of scanning tunneling microscopy, infrared spectroscopy, and kinetic Monte Carlo simulation. We show that this reaction is inherently unstable to kinetic faceting and that the flat-to-faceted transition is driven by the reactivity of a single chemical site present in a concentration of less than 0.4% of a monolayer. In contrast to previously postulated mechanisms, pyramidal faceting does not require "micromasks": chemical heterogeneities, such as impurities, insoluble etch products, or H 2 (g), that collect on the surface during etching and act as transient nanoscale etch masks. Instead, the etching reaction drives the formation of self-propagating, {111}-faced nanoscale hillocks. This study shows that the chemical control of surface morphology can be driven by minority species at concentrations far below the detection limit of surface spectroscopy.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Molecular Mechanism of Etching-Induced Faceting on Si(100): Micromasking Is Not a Prerequisite for Pyramidal Texturing

Skibinski

Hines

2014

J. Phys. Chem. C

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“…Simplistically, f may be set as 1/n 2 (0.084) resulting in R fn to be in the range of 0.92. But for front surfaces consisting of pyramids (as in state-of-the-art silicon solar cell), f may turn out to be larger than 1/n 2 [45]. For a near perfect photonic crystal, f may indeed tend towards zero thereby ensuring a very high value of front surface internal reflectivity [43].…”

Section: Understanding the Phenomenon: Light Trappingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Investigating the Potential of Nanoplasmonics for Efficiency Enhancement of Wafer Based Crystalline Silicon Solar Cells

et al. 2015

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Nanoplasmonics has gained significant research interest for photovoltaic applications due to their ability to construct optically thick but physically thin photovoltaic absorbers for high efficiency solar cells including thin (10-50 μm), ultrathin (≤10 μm) crystalline silicon solar cells, and amorphous silicon solar cells. In this paper, we investigate the potential of metal and dielectric nanoparticles on the efficiency enhancement of wafer based crystalline silicon solar cells having a physical thickness of 180 μm. We explore on whether the use of nanoplasmonics can boost the efficiency even further for state-of-the-art crystalline silicon solar cells. The effect of nanoplasmonics on the important performance metrics like reflectance, light trapping, and series resistance have been thoroughly studied for probable efficiency enhancement of wafer based cells. It is seen that the benefits offered by nanoplasmonics for efficiency enhancement of thin solar cells are limited for physically thick absorbers. A simple analytical model has been proposed and experiments carried out to validate the same.

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“…[12][13][14] The nanorod structure can be formed by a deposition process, and the nanoporous structure can be fabricated by a plasma dry etching process on a Si surface. [15][16][17] The light spectrum is very sensitive on nanostructures, and the photonic band gap can be formed for a certain spectral range, which is very useful to guide the light into the material.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Nanopatterned Silicon Emitters of a Solar Cell Fabricated by Anodic Aluminum Oxide Masks

Choi¹,

Parida²,

Lee³

et al. 2011

J. Nanosci. Nanotech.

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We investigated the nanopattern transferring process by a template of anodic aluminum oxide and the formation of a nanoporous aluminum oxide layer on a Si solar cell by the anodization process of Al thin films. The anodization process provided a template to transfer the nanopattern onto the Si surface. The small-sized nanoporous alumina template was attached to be covered on the textured surface and played the role of etching mask in the F-based dry etching process. Furthermore, we deposited an Al thin film onto the Si surface and the subsequent anodization process was performed. The alumina formulated on the deposited Al thin film did not show the array of nanoporous structure and no nanopatterns were transferred onto the surface. The large-areal alumina deposited on the Si surface showed enhanced photo-absorption in the ultraviolet spectral region of 243 nm, but increased the photo-reflectance in the visible and infrared spectral regions when compared to the Si-bare sample.

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Influence of surface texturization on the light trapping and spectral response of silicon solar cells

Cited by 33 publications

References 5 publications

Molecular Mechanism of Etching-Induced Faceting on Si(100): Micromasking Is Not a Prerequisite for Pyramidal Texturing

Molecular Mechanism of Etching-Induced Faceting on Si(100): Micromasking Is Not a Prerequisite for Pyramidal Texturing

Investigating the Potential of Nanoplasmonics for Efficiency Enhancement of Wafer Based Crystalline Silicon Solar Cells

Nanopatterned Silicon Emitters of a Solar Cell Fabricated by Anodic Aluminum Oxide Masks

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