Large area deposition of intrinsic microcrystalline silicon for thin film solar cells

This paper addresses the development of intrinsic μc-Si:H films on 30×30 cm² substrate size as an intermediate step towards industry-size substrates (typically -1 m²) by PECVD using 13.56 MHz excitation frequency. The authors succeeded in preparing high quality μc-Si:H i-layers with good homogeneity over 27×27 cm². The corresponding deposition rates were 4-11 Å/s. The excellent material quality of these intrinsic μc-Si:H films was proven by small area (1 cm²) p-i-n solar cells with 8.1 and 6.6% efficiency at deposition rates of 5 and 10 Å/s, respectively. The doped layers of these cells were prepared in a small area PECVD reactor