Mathematical modeling of residual stress formation in electron beam remelting and refining of scrap silicon for the production of solar-grade silicon

A technique based on electron beam melting and refining has been used to refine N-type scrap silicon for the purpose of producing material suitable for photovoltaic applications. In this paper, the experimental setup and methodology are described and are presented together with the experimental results for three experiments. Temperature data obtained from embedded thermocouples for one of the experiments is presented. Neutron diffraction analysis was employed to measure the residual strain in the three castings. Finite element thermal and stress mathematical models are employed to predict the residual stress distribution.