Recombination and Resistive Losses of Transferred Foil Contacts for Silicon Heterojunction Solar Cells. Issue 11 (15th September 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Iqbal, Nafis; Li, Mengjie; Gregory, Geoffrey; Dahal, Som; Bowden, Stuart; Davis, Kristopher O.
• Is Part Of: Physica status solidi. Volume 14:Issue 11(2020)
• Page Start: n/a
• Page End: n/a
• Publication Date: 2020-09-15
• Subjects: amorphous silicon -- crystalline silicon -- electrically conductive adhesives -- foils -- silicon heterojunction solar cells; Solid state physics -- Periodicals; 530.4105
• DOI: 10.1002/pssr.202000368
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1862-6254

Abstract

Abstract : Silicon heterojunction (SHJ) solar cells have been studied extensively due to their potential to reach high energy conversion efficiencies. However, one of the limiting factors for this technology is the metallization, which uses low‐curing‐temperature silver pastes that result in fingers with higher bulk resistivity. Herein, a simple approach to fabricate the SHJ solar cell contacts is demonstrated with commercially available low‐cost silver (Ag) electrically conductive adhesive (ECA) pastes and aluminium (Al) foils. This technique can result in a transparent conductive oxide (TCO)‐free cell structure and has the potential to combine cell metallization and interconnection. Recombination and resistive loss analyses are performed on the fabricated test samples. A dark saturation current density at the contact ( J 0c ) of 3.05 fA cm −2 for test samples before annealing is reported. The analysis of the experimental and simulated photoluminescence (PL) images shows negligible added recombination. The contact resistivity ( ρ c ) value is 49.3 mΩ cm 2 after annealing which can be optimized by specialized ECA pastes. Abstract : A novel low‐cost approach to fabricate metal contacts for silicon heterojunction solar cells, called the transferred foil contact, is presented using aluminum foils with silver‐based electrically conductive adhesive (ECA) pastes. The dark saturation current density at the contact is found to be ≈3 fA cm −2, and the contact resistivity is found to be ≈49.3 mΩ cm 2 after annealing.