• Transactions on Electrical and Electronic Materials
• /
• v.4 no.5
• /
• pp.10-14
• /
• 2003

A low-cost, large area, random, maskless texturing scheme independent of crystal orientation is expected to have significant impact on terrestrial photovoltaic technology. We investigated silicon surface microstructures formed by reactive ion etching (R IE) in Multi-Hollow cathode system. Desirable texturing effect has been achieved when radio-frequency (rf) power of about 20 Watt per one hollow cathode glow is applied for our RF Multi -Hollow cathode system. The black silicon etched surface shows almost zero reflectance in the visible region as well as in near IR region. The etched silicon surface is covered by columnar microstructures with diameters from 50 to 100 nm and depth of about 500 nm. We have successfully achieved 11.7 % efficiency of mono-crystalline silicon solar cell and 10.2 % for multi-crystalline silicon solar cell.

• Journal of the Korean Crystal Growth and Crystal Technology
• /
• v.20 no.1
• /
• pp.7-11
• /
• 2010

The reduction of optical losses in mono-crystalline silicon solar cell by surface texturing is a critical step to improve the overall cell efficiency. In this study, we have changed the sub-micrometer structure on the micrometer pyramidal structure by 2-step texturing. The Ag particles were coated on the micrometer pyramid surface in $AgNO_3$ solution, and then the etching with hydrogen fluoride and hydrogen peroxide created even smaller nano-pyramids in these pyramids. As a result, we observed that the changes of size and thickness of nano structure on pyramidal surface were determined by $AgNO_3$ concentration and etching time. Using 2-step texturing, the surface of wafers is etched to resemble the rough surface of a lotus leaf. Lotus surface can reduce average reflectance from 10% to below 3%. This reflectance is less than conventional textured wafer including anti-reflection coating.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
• /
• v.15 no.4
• /
• pp.67-72
• /
• 2016

In this study, the texturing and the emitter formation processes were carried out with the wafer adhesion method to increase the productivity and reduce the production cost of the multi-crystalline silicon solar cell. After fabricating $156{\times}156mm$ solar cell according to the wafer adhesion method, the operation characteristics were analyzed and compared with those of the solar cell fabricated by the standard process method. In the case of a solar cell formed by the wafer adhesion method, it showed Jsc of $32.87mA/cm^2$, Voc of 0.612V, FF of 78.04% and efficiency of 15.71% respectively. The efficiency of the solar cell formed by the wafer adhesion method was 0.1% higher than that of the solar cell formed by the standard method. In addition, the productivity of the texturing and the emitter formation processes is expected to be approximately doubled. Therefore, it is expected that the manufacturing cost of the multi-crystalline solar cell can be reduced due to the improved productivity compared with the standard process.

• Journal of information and communication convergence engineering
• /
• v.9 no.4
• /
• pp.461-465
• /
• 2011

An aluminum doped zinc oxide (AZO) film for front contacts of thin film solar cells, in this work, were deposited by r.f. magnetron sputtering, and then etched in diluted hydrochloric acid solution for different times. Effects of surface texturing on the electro-optical properties of AZO films were investigated. Also, to clarify the light trapping of textured AZO film, amorphous silicon thin film solar cells were fabricated on the textured AZO/glass substrate and the performance of solar cells were studied. After texturing, the spectral haze at the visible range of 400 ~750 nm increased substantially with the etching time, without a change in the resistivity. The conversion efficiency of amorphous Si solar cells with textured AZO film as a front electrode was improved by the increase of short-circuit current density ($J_{sc}$), compared to cell with flat AZO films.

• Current Photovoltaic Research
• /
• v.5 no.1
• /
• pp.25-27
• /
• 2017

Nanoscale textured black silicon has attracted intensive attention due to its great potential as applications in multicrystalline silicon-based solar cells. It absorbs sunlight over a broad range of wavelengths but introduces large recombination centers, non-uniform doping into cell. In this study, we present a metal-assisted chemical etching technique plus alkaline etching process to fabricate nanoscale pyramid structures with optimized condition. To make the structures, silver nanoparticles-loaded mc-Si wafer was submerged into $H_2O_2/HF$ solution first for nanohole texturing the wafer and textured wafer etched again with KOH solution for making nanoscale pyramid structures. The average reflectivity (350-1050 nm) is about 8.42% with anti-reflection coating.

• Current Photovoltaic Research
• /
• v.6 no.1
• /
• pp.27-30
• /
• 2018

The dependency of the electrical characteristics of silicon solar-cells on the depth of damaged layer induced by wire-sawing process was investigated. To compare cell efficiency with residual sawing damage, silicon solar-cells were fabricated by using as-sawn wafers having different depth of saw damage without any damaged etching process. The damaged layer induced by wire-sawing process in silicon bulk intensely influenced the value of fill factor on solar cells, degrading fill factor to 57.20%. In addition, the photovoltaic characteristics of solar cells applying texturing process shows that although the initial depth of saw-damage induced by wire-sawing process was different, the value of short-circuit current, fill-factor, and power-conversion-efficiency have an almost same, showing ~17.4% of cell efficiency. It indicated that the degradation of solar-cell efficiency induced by wire-sawing process could be prevented by eliminating all damaged layer through sufficient pyramid-surface texturing process.

• 한국태양에너지학회:학술대회논문집
• /
• 2009.11a
• /
• pp.383-387
• /
• 2009

Multi-crystalline silicon surface etching without grain-boundary delineation is a challenging task for the fabrication of high efficiency solar cell. The use of sodium hydroxide - sodium hypochlorite (NaOH40% + NaOCl 12%) solution for texturing multi-crystalline silicon wafer surface in solar cell fabrication line is reported in this article. in light current-voltage results, the cells etched in NaOH 40% + NaOCl 12% = 1:2 exhibited higher short circuit current and open circuit voltage than those of the cells etched in NaOH 40% + NaOCl 12% = 1:1 solution. we have obtained 15.19% conversion efficiency in large area(156cm2) multi-Si solar cells etched in NaOH 40% + NaOCl 12% = 1:1 solution.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
• /
• v.20 no.12
• /
• pp.649-653
• /
• 2010

In this paper, double texturization of multi crystalline silicon solar cells was studied with laser and reactive ion etching (RIE). In the case of multi crystalline silicon wafers, chemical etching has problems in producing a uniform surface texture. Thus various etching methods such as laser and dry texturization have been studied for multi crystalline silicon wafers. In this study, laser texturization with an Nd:$YVO_4$ green laser was performed first to get the proper hole spacing and $300{\mu}m$ was found to be the most proper value. Laser texturization on crystalline silicon wafers was followed by damage removal in acid solution and RIE to achieve double texturization. This study showed that double texturization on multi crystalline silicon wafers with laser firing and RIE resulted in lower reflectance, higher quantum yield and better efficiency than that process without RIE. However, RIE formed sharp structures on the silicon wafer surfaces, which resulted in 0.8% decrease of fill factor at solar cell characterization. While chemical etching makes it difficult to obtain a uniform surface texture for multi crystalline silicon solar cells, the process of double texturization with laser and RIE yields a uniform surface structure, diminished reflectance, and improved efficiency. This finding lays the foundation for the study of low-cost, high efficiency multi crystalline silicon solar cells.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
• /
• v.19 no.1
• /
• pp.18-23
• /
• 2009

The influence of various surface morphologies on the mechanical strength of silicon substrates was investigated in this study. The yield for the solar cell industry is mainly related to the fracturing of silicon wafers during the manufacturing process. The flexural strengths of silicon substrates were influenced by the density of the pyramids as well as by the size and the rounded surface of the pyramids. To characterize and optimize the relevant texturing process in terms of mechanical stability and the fabrication yield, the mechanical properties of textured silicon substrates were investigated to optimize the size and morphology of random pyramids. Several types of silicon substrates were studied, including the planar type, a textured surface with large and small pyramids, and a textured surface with rounded pyramids. The surface morphology and a cross-section of the as-textured and fractured silicon substrates were investigated by scanning electron microscopy.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
• /
• 2010.06a
• /
• pp.133-133
• /
• 2010

We studied the thermal and electric effect of 2D and 3D p-n photovoltaic diode structures with and without surface texturing. By analyzing the numerical simulation results of I-V characteristics and lattice temperature distributions, we systematically studied the effect of different texturing structures and different doping concentration on the characteristics of the silicon p-n photovoltaic devices. The, efficiency of the device with the surface texturing shows more than ~ 2% enhancement compared to the reference devices without texturing. The tendency of the efficiency of doping concentration has been studied with boron doping of $10^{14}{\sim}10^{17}cm^{-3}$ and phosphorus doping of $10^{15}cm^{-3}$. In addition to that, the study of changing phosphorus doping of $10^{15}{\sim}10^{18}cm^{-3}$ with boron doping of $10^{14}cm^{-3}$ has been examined. It has been shown that the texturing structure not only improves the light trapping but also plays an important role in the heat radiation.