EVA polycrystalline silicon thin-film solar cells on textured glass

EVA solar cells are a novel type of poly-Si thin-film solar cell on glass that has recently been developed at UNSW (EVA = solid-phase crystallisation of evaporated a-Si). In this paper, EVA solar cells are for the first time made on textured glass. The glass substrates are textured with the UNSW-developed AIT process (AIT = aluminium-induced texture). The AIT texture is shown to have a beneficial effect on the absorption in EVA films (antireflection and light trapping effect). A SiN barrier layer on the AIT-textured glass substrates is shown to significantly improve both the crystalline quality of EVA poly-Si films and the energy conversion efficiency of the resulting solar cells. The results reported in this paper represent a good basis for a thorough optimization study of this promising poly-Si thin-film PV technology on glass.