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U.S. Department of Energy
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Defect-Band Emission Photoluminescence Imaging on Multi-Crystalline Si Solar Cells

Conference ·

Defect-band photoluminescence (PL) imaging with an InGaAs camera was applied to multicrystalline silicon (mc-Si) wafers, which were taken from different heights of different Si bricks. Neighboring wafers were picked at six different processing steps, from as-cut to post-metallization. By using different cut-off filters, we were able to separate the band-to-band emission images from the defect-band emission images. On the defect-band emission images, the bright regions that originate from the grain boundaries and defect clusters were extracted from the PL images. The area fraction percentage of these regions at various processing stages shows a correlation with the final cell electrical parameters.

Research Organization:
National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO.
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Solar Energy Technologies Program
DOE Contract Number:
AC36-08GO28308
OSTI ID:
1048599
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English