Reflectance reduction in large-area nanostructured c-Si solar cells using dry etching method

The enhanced photoelectric conversion is demonstrated in nanostructured photovoltaics using colloidal lithography and reactive-ion-etching (RIE) techniques. From the reflectance spectroscopy, trapezoid-cone arrays (TCAs) Si with SiNx passivation layer effectively suppress the Fresnel reflection in the wavelength range from 400 nm to 1000 nm. The power conversion shows the TCAs Si solar cell with 120 nm thickness of SiNx passivation layer achieves 13.736%, which is 8.87% and 2.56% enhancement compared to the conventional KOH-textured photovoltaics and TCAs with 80-nm-thick SiNx, respectively. An optical simulation based on RCWA describes the optimized shape of nanostructure to further reduce reflectance for maximum light absorption.