Upright and Inverted Single-Junction GaAs Solar Cells Grown by Hydride Vapor Phase Epitaxy

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38 Scopus Citations

Abstract

Hydride vapor phase epitaxy (HVPE) is a low-cost alternative to conventional metal-organic vapor phase epitaxy (MOVPE) growth of III-V solar cells. In this work, we show continued improvement of the performance of HVPE-grown single-junction GaAs solar cells. We show over an order of magnitude improvement in the interface recombination velocity between GaAs and GaInP layers through the elimination of growth interrupts, leading to increased short-circuit current density and open-circuit voltage compared with cells with interrupts. One-sun conversion efficiencies as high as 20.6% were achieved with this improved growth process. Solar cells grown in an inverted configuration that were removed from the substrate showed nearly identical performance to on-wafer cells, demonstrating the viability of HVPE to be used together with conventional wafer reuse techniques for further cost reduction. These devices utilized multiple heterointerfaces, showing the potential of HVPE for the growth of complex and high-quality III-V devices.

Original languageAmerican English
Article number7592883
Pages (from-to)157-161
Number of pages5
JournalIEEE Journal of Photovoltaics
Volume7
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - Jan 2017

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 IEEE.

NREL Publication Number

  • NREL/JA-5J00-67042

Keywords

  • Gallium arsenide
  • hydride vapor phase epitaxy (HVPE)
  • Photovoltaics (PVs)

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