Mitigation of J–V distortion in CdTe solar cells by Ga-doping of MgZnO emitter

Pandey, Ramesh; Shah, Akash; Munshi, Amit; Shimpi, Tushar; Jundt, Pascal; Guo, Jinglong; Klie, Robert F.; Sampath, Walajabad S.; Sites, James R.

doi:10.1016/j.solmat.2021.111324

Cited by 13 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…Similar behavior has been observed in other solar cells, such as CIGS, [ 31 ] CdTe [ 32 ] and CZTS [ 33 ] solar cells, leading to J – V distortion. The researchers believe that these changes in the electrical properties of thin‐film solar cells and the phenomenon of J – V distortion can be represented by assuming a particular highly doped p‐type (HDP) thin‐film material between the buffer and absorber layers.…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 84%

“…[25] Therefore, inter-diffusion is a significant limitation on the performance of Sb 2 Se 3 /CdS solar cells, causing severe J-V distortions [29] and illumination instability. [6] Similar behavior has been observed in other solar cells, such as CIGS, [31] CdTe [32] and CZTS [33] solar cells, leading to J-V distortion. The researchers believe that these changes in the electrical properties of thin-film solar cells and the phenomenon of J-V distortion can be represented by assuming a particular highly doped p-type (HDP) thin-film material between the buffer and absorber layers.…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 78%

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An Analytical Model for Sb₂Se₃ Thin‐Film Solar Cells by Considering Current‐Voltage Distortion

Gharibshahian

Orouji

Sharbati

2022

Advcd Theory and Sims

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Antimony selenide (Sb2Se3) solar cells often demonstrate current–voltage (J–V) distortion at low temperature, particularly at reverse bias or under red‐light irradiation. A highly doped p‐type (HDP) thin layer between the buffer and absorber layers is typically supposed to induce the J–V distortion. In this work, an analytical model for the experimental Sb2Se3 solar cell has been presented to investigate the effect of the HDP layer characteristics on the J–V distortion. This proposed model can also calculate the critical voltage at which the J–V distortion occurs. The results show that the Sb2Se3 solar cells with the HDP layer have low efficiency when doping concentration and thickness of the HDP layer increase due to a large J–V distortion. This study confirms that the presence of an electron barrier in the conduction band formed by the HDP layer can cause J–V distortion. Hence, the effect of electron barrier height on cell performance based on the derived formulas is investigated. Finally, comparing the simulation and modeling results with variations of the physical and electrical properties of the HDP layer provides a good evaluation for understanding the behavior of Sb2Se3 solar cells.

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Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 84%

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 78%

An Analytical Model for Sb₂Se₃ Thin‐Film Solar Cells by Considering Current‐Voltage Distortion

Gharibshahian

Orouji

Sharbati

2022

Advcd Theory and Sims

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“…Though the ZMO buffer layer incorporation can amend this recombination, it has been rather difficult to reproducibly fabricate efficient Cd(Se,Te) solar cells using ZMO as the buffer layer [17][18][19] . The major obstacle is the low electron conductivity of ZMO buffer, which is difficult to improve even with extrinsic doping 20,21 . When the ZMO layer, which forms a spike-like CBM alignment with Cd(Se,Te), is too resistive, the Cd(Se,Te) solar cells often show the so-called S-kink character in the photocurrent density-voltage (J-V) curves, which leads to low fill factors (FFs) 16,18,22 .…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

20%-efficient polycrystalline Cd(Se,Te) thin-film solar cells with compositional gradient near the front junction

Bista

Awni

et al. 2022

Nat Commun

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Bandgap gradient is a proven approach for improving the open-circuit voltages (VOCs) in Cu(In,Ga)Se2 and Cu(Zn,Sn)Se2 thin-film solar cells, but has not been realized in Cd(Se,Te) thin-film solar cells, a leading thin-film solar cell technology in the photovoltaic market. Here, we demonstrate the realization of a bandgap gradient in Cd(Se,Te) thin-film solar cells by introducing a Cd(O,S,Se,Te) region with the same crystal structure of the absorber near the front junction. The formation of such a region is enabled by incorporating oxygenated CdS and CdSe layers. We show that the introduction of the bandgap gradient reduces the hole density in the front junction region and introduces a small spike in the band alignment between this and the absorber regions, effectively suppressing the nonradiative recombination therein and leading to improved VOCs in Cd(Se,Te) solar cells using commercial SnO2 buffers. A champion device achieves an efficiency of 20.03% with a VOC of 0.863 V.

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“…Current research has found that the devices with MZO buffer layers suffer from metastability effects in J-V characteristics showing an `S` shaped behaviour (often called `kink` type) before any preconditioning, such as light soaking [9][10] [11] [12]. Other work has shown that degradation of the MZO layer occurs if the layer is exposed to humidity in the atmosphere [13].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ga-doping of MZO in CdSeTe/CdTe Thin Film Solar Cells

Togay

Shimpi

Walajabad

et al. 2022

2022 IEEE 49th Photovoltaics Specialists Conference (PVSC)

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Metastable effects in high efficiency MZO/CdSeTe/CdTe solar cells have been studied in an attempt to recover the device performance. Devices with the MZO buffer layer have shown an `S` shaped behaviour in the J-V characteristics before any preconditioning. This is removed after light soaking under 1000 Wm -2 at 25 °C. However, this recovery remained only for a short period of time while the devices were stored under vacuum in the dark. Recent studies with Ga doping of the buffer MZO has shown the removal of this metastability in the J-V characteristics of CdTe devices can be achieved without light soaking. A significant improvement in conductivity and Hall signal has been measured with Ga doped MZO layers compared to previously measured MZO films. However, a gradual decrease in the Hall signal has been observed over time after films were light soaked and removed from the desiccator.

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Mitigation of J–V distortion in CdTe solar cells by Ga-doping of MgZnO emitter

Cited by 13 publications

References 28 publications

An Analytical Model for Sb₂Se₃ Thin‐Film Solar Cells by Considering Current‐Voltage Distortion

An Analytical Model for Sb₂Se₃ Thin‐Film Solar Cells by Considering Current‐Voltage Distortion

20%-efficient polycrystalline Cd(Se,Te) thin-film solar cells with compositional gradient near the front junction

Ga-doping of MZO in CdSeTe/CdTe Thin Film Solar Cells

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Mitigation of J–V distortion in CdTe solar cells by Ga-doping of MgZnO emitter

Cited by 13 publications

References 28 publications

An Analytical Model for Sb2Se3 Thin‐Film Solar Cells by Considering Current‐Voltage Distortion

An Analytical Model for Sb2Se3 Thin‐Film Solar Cells by Considering Current‐Voltage Distortion

20%-efficient polycrystalline Cd(Se,Te) thin-film solar cells with compositional gradient near the front junction

Ga-doping of MZO in CdSeTe/CdTe Thin Film Solar Cells

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An Analytical Model for Sb₂Se₃ Thin‐Film Solar Cells by Considering Current‐Voltage Distortion

An Analytical Model for Sb₂Se₃ Thin‐Film Solar Cells by Considering Current‐Voltage Distortion