Exfoliated thin, flexible monocrystalline germanium heterojunction solar cells

A thin, flexible monocrystalline germanium (c-Ge) heterojunction solar cell has been developed based on a cost-effective kerfless exfoliation process and remote plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (RPCVD) of hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H). The performance of the exfoliated 50μm thick and bulk 500μm Ge heterojunction cells are compared in this paper. A superior conversion efficiency of 5.28% was achieved with the 50μm exfoliated Ge cell versus 1.78% for the bulk Ge cell, in agreement with simulation results. A record fill factor of 58.1% for an a-Si:H/c-Ge heterojunction cell is obtained with the exfoliated cell. Moreover, the conversion efficiency achieved with the 50μm exfoliated cell (without intrinsic a-Si:H passivation) is comparable to the best reported in literature with bulk Ge heterojunction cells and intrinsic a-S:H passivation.