High-Efficiency, Flexible CdTe Solar Cells on Ultra-Thin Glass Substrates

H. P. Mahabaduge; W. L. Rance; J. M. Burst; M. O. Reese; D. M. Meysing; C. A. Wolden; J. Li; J. D. Beach; T. A. Gessert; W. K. Metzger; S. Garner; T. M. Barnes

doi:10.1063/1.4916634

High-Efficiency, Flexible CdTe Solar Cells on Ultra-Thin Glass Substrates

H. P. Mahabaduge, W. L. Rance, J. M. Burst, M. O. Reese, D. M. Meysing, C. A. Wolden, J. Li, J. D. Beach, T. A. Gessert, W. K. Metzger, S. Garner, T. M. Barnes

Materials Science

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

117 Scopus Citations

Abstract

Flexible, high-efficiency, low-cost solar cells can enable applications that take advantage of high specific power, flexible form factors, lower installation and transportation costs. Here, we report a certified record efficiency of 16.4% for a flexible CdTe solar cell that is a marked improvement over the previous standard (14.05%). The improvement was achieved by replacing chemical-bath-deposited CdS with sputtered CdS:O and also replacing the high-temperature sputtered ZnTe:Cu back contact layer with co-evaporated and rapidly annealed ZnTe:Cu. We use quantum efficiency and capacitance-voltage measurements combined with device simulations to identify the reasons for the increase in efficiency. Both device simulations and experimental results show that higher carrier density can quantitatively account for the increased open circuit voltage (V_OC) and Fill Factor (FF), and likewise, the increase in short circuit current density (J_SC) can be attributed to the more transparent CdS:O.

Original language	American English
Article number	133501
Number of pages	4
Journal	Applied Physics Letters
Volume	106
Issue number	13
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4916634 https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4916634
State	Published - 30 Mar 2015

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.

NREL Publication Number

NREL/JA-5K00-63598

Keywords

CdTe
flexible
II-VI semiconductor materials
photovoltaic cells

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Mahabaduge, H. P., Rance, W. L., Burst, J. M., Reese, M. O., Meysing, D. M., Wolden, C. A., Li, J., Beach, J. D., Gessert, T. A., Metzger, W. K., Garner, S., & Barnes, T. M. (2015). High-Efficiency, Flexible CdTe Solar Cells on Ultra-Thin Glass Substrates. Applied Physics Letters, 106(13), Article 133501. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4916634, https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4916634

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High-Efficiency, Flexible CdTe Solar Cells on Ultra-Thin Glass Substrates

Abstract

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Keywords

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