Improvements in stability of a-silicon solar cells through the use of bandgap grading

Author

Dalal, Vikram L. ; Baldwin, Greg ; Garikepati, P.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Iowa State Univ., Ames, IA, USA

fYear

1993

fDate

10-14 May 1993

Firstpage

816

Lastpage

820

Abstract

The authors examine the causes of instability in a-Si:H solar cells, and use a graded bandgap design, combined with high temperature deposition of a-Si:H to achieve both high performance and higher stability. They show that in order to achieve good devices at high temperatures, the design of appropriate buffer layers between p and i, and the deposition of the p layer are both important. They also show that interfaces play a major role in degradation

Keywords

amorphous semiconductors; elemental semiconductors; energy gap; hydrogen; p-n heterojunctions; plasma deposited coatings; plasma deposition; semiconductor device testing; semiconductor doping; semiconductor thin films; silicon; solar cells; RF glow discharge deposition; a-Si:H solar cells; bandgap grading; buffer layers; degradation; design; fabrication; high temperature deposition; interfaces; performance; stability; testing; thin film semiconductor; Buffer layers; Degradation; Helium; High performance computing; Microelectronics; Photonic band gap; Photovoltaic cells; Plasma stability; Plasma temperature; Spontaneous emission;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Photovoltaic Specialists Conference, 1993., Conference Record of the Twenty Third IEEE

Conference_Location

Louisville, KY

Print_ISBN

0-7803-1220-1

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/PVSC.1993.347116

Filename

347116