A ftir, raman and SEM - EBSD - EDS microstructure characterization of plasma thermally sprayed silicon sheet for low cost solar cells substrate

Polycrystalline silicon still guarantees its application on solar cells as important market product until year 2050. Due to the increase of photovoltaic industry needing, technologies to produce low cost silicon will be needed. The metallurgical grade silicon (Si-GM) has been used to produce Si substrates by the atmospheric plasma thermal spray (APTS) which has the advantages of a low cost and fast process. The aim of this work is to characterize the APTS Si sheet microstructure and chemical composition to promote its technology association for low cost solar cell substrate production. The raw material and APTS Si sheet were characterized by scanning electron microscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and Raman spectroscopy. The results showed a structural mixed silicon sheet with different levels of crystalline fraction, amorphous structures contribution, phase transitions regions, crystallite size distribution as well as a mainly silicon oxides covered surface.