Researchers in China have tried to increase the efficiency of hetero junction solar cell via a buffer layer made of indium tinoxide. This innovation reportedly resulted in an efficiency increase of 0.1% from optimized short-circuit density and filling factor.
A group of researchers in China has manufactured a heterojunction (HJT) solar cell based on an indium tinoxide (ITO) buffer layer with the aim of improving the optical and electrical properties of the device.
“High power prepared Indiumtinoxide (ITO) layers have made an important contribution to improving the crystal quality of films and the capacity of silicon heterojunction solar cells,” said the corresponding author of the research, Daxue du, said PV -Magazine. “However, it generally causes sputter damage, resulting in the breakdown of photovoltaic performance. In this work we have designed an ITO buffer layer on industrial SHJ sun cells and we discussed the optical and electrical performance in detail using the Monolayer ITO film as a basin.”
The scientists built the cell with a 120 μm n-type monocrystalline silicon waffer of 182 mm x 105 mm, with the hydrogenated
Amorphic and microcrystalline silicon passivation films are passivated via plasma-improved chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) and the ITO layer is deposited by physical vapor deposits (PVD). Silver schedules were manufactured via screenshot and glowed at 200 C.
“The double -layer ITO is specifically designed to achieve improved electrical performance in the thin buffer layer prepared at low power and O2 concentration, while optical performance in the thicker outer layer is also improved prepared at higher power and O2 concentration,” the group explained. “It is designed to obtain smaller refractive indices and smaller extinction coefficients, which resulted in a higher generation of short -circuit current.”
Tested under standard lighting conditions, the cell reached a power conversion -efficiency of 25.36 %, the scientists said it is 0.1 % more than that of devices without the ITO buffer layer. Both carrier concentration and carrier mobility were improved as a result of the decrease in chemisorbed oxygen and the increase in oxygen vacancies respectively, which leads to a lower resistance and a higher filling factor.
“We believe that the current work has a potentially feasible approach for a high yield and high efficiency of industrial silicon heterojunction solar cells,” Du concluded.
The new concept of solar cells was described in the study “Optimized optical and electrical properties for silicon hetero junction solar cells with an IndiumTin oxide buffer layer“Which was recently published in Solar energy materials and solar cells. The research team consisted of academics of the Chinese startup Shanghai Hency Solar Technology and Shanghai Jiao Tong University.
Other researchers from the Shanghai Jiao Tong University recently evaluated the impact of tender in the production of hetero junction (HJT) solar cell technologies.
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