Low-Cost Plasma Immersion Ion Implantation Doping for Interdigitated Back Passivated Contact (IBPC) Solar Cells

David Young, William Nemeth, Vincenzo LaSalvia, Matthew Page, Pauls Stradins, San Theingi, Jeffery Aguiar

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

35 Scopus Citations

Abstract

We present progress to develop low-cost interdigitated back contact solar cells with pc-Si/SiO2/c-Si passivated contacts formed by plasma immersion ion implantation (PIII). PIII is a lower-cost implantation technique than traditional beam line implantation due to its simpler design, lower operating costs, and ability to run high doses (1E14–1E18 cm−2) at low ion energies (20 eV–10 keV). These benefits make PIII ideal for high throughput production of patterned passivated contacts, where high-dose, low-energy implantations are made into thin (20–200 nm) a-Si layers instead of into the wafer itself. For this work symmetric passivated contact test structures (~100 nm thick) grown on n-Cz wafers with pH3 PIII doping gave implied open circuit voltage (iVoc) values of 730 mV with Jo values of 2 fA/cm2. Samples doped with B2H6 gave iVoc values of 690 mV and Jo values of 24 fA/cm2, outperforming BF3 doping, which gave iVoc values in the 660–680 mV range. Samples were further characterized by SIMS, photoluminescence, TEM, EELS, and post-metallization TLM to reveal micro- and macro-scopic structural, chemical and electrical information.

Original languageAmerican English
Pages (from-to)68-76
Number of pages9
JournalSolar Energy Materials and Solar Cells
Volume158
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Dec 2016

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2016

NREL Publication Number

  • NREL/JA-5J00-66528

Keywords

  • Passivated contacts
  • Plasma immersion ion implantation
  • Silicon
  • Solar cells

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