Industrial type passivation on interdigitated back junction solar cells

Author

Robbelein, J. ; Van Kerschaver, E. ; Posthuma, N.E. ; Poortmans, J.

Author_Institution

IMEC, Leuven, Belgium

fYear

2009

fDate

7-12 June 2009

Abstract

Interdigitated Back Junction (IBJ) solar cells are suited to be realized on thin wafers, since they need a combination of high diffusion lengths and thin substrates. Here we present an industrial type passivation stack at the rear surface of an IBJ solar cell, consisting of a low quality SiO₂ and a SiN_x layer, which has proven its value in the i-PERC concept developed at IMEC. Quasi-Steady-State Photo Conductance (QSSPC) lifetime measurements indicate an improvement of lifetime from 10Â¿s to 180Â¿s after application and rapid thermal processing (RTP) of the industrial passivation stack. For the IBJ solar cell concept without back surface field (BSF); this results in an absolute increase in energy conversion efficiency of 2% absolute, going from 14% to 16% and with a BSF up to 18%. Out of the presented cell data we can conclude the excellent passivation quality of the applied industrial passivation stack.

Keywords

passivation; photoconductivity; rapid thermal processing; silicon compounds; solar cells; SiO₂-SiN_x; energy conversion efficiency; industrial type passivation stack; interdigitated back junction solar cells; quasisteady-state photo conductance; rapid thermal processing; thin wafers; time 10 mus to 180 mus; Charge carriers; Costs; Lifetime estimation; Passivation; Photovoltaic cells; Photovoltaic systems; Rapid thermal processing; Silicon; Solar power generation; Thermal conductivity;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Photovoltaic Specialists Conference (PVSC), 2009 34th IEEE

Conference_Location

Philadelphia, PA

ISSN

0160-8371

Print_ISBN

978-1-4244-2949-3

Electronic_ISBN

0160-8371

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/PVSC.2009.5411127

Filename

5411127