Photocarrier collection in a-SiC:H/c-Si heterojunction solar cells

Cleef, M. W. M. van; Rubinelli, Francisco Alberto; Rath, J.K.; Schropp, R.E.I.; Weg, W. F. van der; Rizzoli, R.; Summonte, C.; Pinghini, R.; Centurioni, E.; Galloni, R.

doi:10.1016/s0022-3093(98)00210-5

Cited by 27 publications

(15 citation statements)

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“…Increasing ⌬E v at the P-a-Si:H/N-c-Si interface results in hole accumulation and therefore a fall in FF for ⌬E v Ն 0.56 eV, for a P-layer activation energy of ϳ0.3 eV, due to the reverse field it generates; that is further accentuated when E ac is high ͑Table VI͒. van Cleef et al 35 have also shown that for a P-layer doping density of 9 ϫ 10 18 cm −3 ͑same as ours, Table III, giving E ac = 0.3 eV͒ and for ⌬E v = 0.43 eV, normal J-V characteristics are achieved at room temperature and AM1.5 illumination, and that "S-shaped" characteristics begin to develop at higher ⌬E v and E ac . In our case, for ⌬E v Ն 0.60 eV, Fig.…”

Section: Sensitivity Of the Solar Cell Output To The P-layer Band mentioning

confidence: 99%

Carrier transport and sensitivity issues in heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer solar cells on N-type crystalline silicon: A computer simulation study

Rahmouni¹,

Datta

Chatterjee

et al. 2010

Journal of Applied Physics

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Heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer or "HIT" solar cells are considered favorable for large-scale manufacturing of solar modules, as they combine the high efficiency of crystalline silicon ͑c-Si͒ solar cells, with the low cost of amorphous silicon technology. In this article, based on experimental data published by Sanyo, we simulate the performance of a series of HIT cells on N-type crystalline silicon substrates with hydrogenated amorphous silicon ͑a-Si:H͒ emitter layers, to gain insight into carrier transport and the general functioning of these devices. Both single and double HIT structures are modeled, beginning with the initial Sanyo cells having low open circuit voltages but high fill factors, right up to double HIT cells exhibiting record values for both parameters. The one-dimensional numerical modeling program "Amorphous Semiconductor Device Modeling Program" has been used for this purpose. We show that the simulations can correctly reproduce the electrical characteristics and temperature dependence for a set of devices with varying I-layer thickness. Under standard AM1.5 illumination, we show that the transport is dominated by the diffusion mechanism, similar to conventional P/N homojunction solar cells, and tunneling is not required to describe the performance of state-of-the art devices. Also modeling has been used to study the sensitivity of N-c-Si HIT solar cell performance to various parameters. We find that the solar cell output is particularly sensitive to the defect states on the surface of the c-Si wafer facing the emitter, to the indium tin oxide/P-a-Si:H front contact barrier height and to the band gap and activation energy of the P-a-Si:H emitter, while the I-a-Si:H layer is necessary to achieve both high V oc and fill factor, as it passivates the defects on the surface of the c-Si wafer. Finally, we describe in detail for most parameters how they affect current transport and cell properties.

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Section: Sensitivity Of the Solar Cell Output To The P-layer Band mentioning

confidence: 99%

Carrier transport and sensitivity issues in heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer solar cells on N-type crystalline silicon: A computer simulation study

Rahmouni¹,

Datta

Chatterjee

et al. 2010

Journal of Applied Physics

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“…Our device simulations show that this structure generally produces irregular current-density-voltage ͑J-V͒ behavior and poor performance, which have been observed experimentally at times. 11,12 The question then arises: how can Sanyo achieve 22% efficiency with n-wafer HIT cells?…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The role of amorphous silicon and tunneling in heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer (HIT) solar cells

Kanevce

Metzger

2009

Journal of Applied Physics

163

102

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This work analyzes heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer (HIT) solar cells using numerical simulations. The differences between the device physics of cells with p- and n-type crystalline silicon (c-Si) wafers are substantial. HIT solar cells with n-type wafers essentially form a n/p/n structure, where tunneling across the junction heterointerfaces is a critical transport mechanism required to attain performance exceeding 20%. For HIT cells with p-type wafers, only tunneling at the back-contact barrier may be important. For p-wafer cells, the hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) between the indium tin oxide (ITO) and crystalline silicon may act as a passivating buffer layer but, otherwise, does not significantly contribute to device performance. For n-wafer cells, the carrier concentration and band alignment of this a-Si:H layer are critical to device performance.

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“…The sample #m6291 presents the typical characteristic of a solar cell, with a high fill factor and an open circuit voltage of 0.6 V, only the curve under red light illumination (k = 650 nm) is presented for clearness purposes, since for the other wavelengths similar curves are observed. In the samples with carbon incorporation on one (#m6301) or both (#m7192) doped layers there is a significant decrease of the short circuit current, and the J-V presents the characteristic S-shape observed in a-Si/c-Si heterojunctions [4]. For these two samples a similar trend is observed, the current saturates for negative bias voltage depending on the wavelength and on the composition of the doped layers, while for positive bias the currents are approximate.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 94%

The laser scanned photodiode: Theoretical and electrical models of the image sensor

Fernandes¹,

Vieira²,

Martins

2006

Journal of Non-Crystalline Solids

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Photocarrier collection in a-SiC:H/c-Si heterojunction solar cells

Cited by 27 publications

References 1 publication

Carrier transport and sensitivity issues in heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer solar cells on N-type crystalline silicon: A computer simulation study

Carrier transport and sensitivity issues in heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer solar cells on N-type crystalline silicon: A computer simulation study

The role of amorphous silicon and tunneling in heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer (HIT) solar cells

The laser scanned photodiode: Theoretical and electrical models of the image sensor

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