Strain Balanced Quantum Well Monolithic Tandem Solar Cells

Author

Loannides, A. ; Tibbits, T.N.D. ; Connolly, J.P. ; Bushnell, D.B. ; Barnham, K.W.J. ; Calder, C. ; Hill, G. ; Roberts, J.S. ; Smekens, G.

Author_Institution

Exp. Solid State Phys., Imperial Coll. London

Volume

1

fYear

2006

fDate

38838

Firstpage

753

Lastpage

756

Abstract

The effect of incorporating strain balanced multi-quantum well structures in InGaP/GaAs monolithic tandem solar cells is investigated. At present the majority of InGaP/GaAs tandem cells are current limited by the bottom GaAs junction. Incorporation of multi-quantum well structures in the GaAs bottom junction extends the cell absorption to longer wavelengths. This allows current matched dual junction tandem cells to achieve higher efficiencies. InGaP/GaAs tandem cells have been studied by overgrowing different top cells on two similar quantum well structures and compared to a InGaP/GaAs control cell. A current matched top cell is presented and efficiency enhancement of a tandem by a quantum well cell demonstrated experimentally for the first time

Keywords

III-V semiconductors; gallium arsenide; gallium compounds; indium compounds; semiconductor quantum wells; solar cells; InGaP-GaAs; cell absorption; dual junction tandem cells; monolithic tandem solar cells; strain balanced multiquantum well structures; top cells; Absorption; Capacitive sensors; Gallium arsenide; III-V semiconductor materials; Indium gallium arsenide; Lattices; Photonic band gap; Photovoltaic cells; Quantum well devices; Voltage;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Photovoltaic Energy Conversion, Conference Record of the 2006 IEEE 4th World Conference on

Conference_Location

Waikoloa, HI

Print_ISBN

1-4244-0017-1

Electronic_ISBN

1-4244-0017-1

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/WCPEC.2006.279565

Filename

4059738