Obtaining Large Columnar CdTe Grains and Long Lifetime on Nanocrystalline CdSe, MgZnO, or CdS Layers

Amarasinghe, Mahisha; Colegrove, Eric; Moseley, John; Moutinho, Helio; Albin, David; Duenow, Joel; Jensen, Soren; Kephart, Jason; Sampath, Walajabad; Sivananthan, Siva; Al-Jassim, Mowafak; Metzger, Wyatt K.

doi:10.1002/aenm.201702666

Title: Obtaining Large Columnar CdTe Grains and Long Lifetime on Nanocrystalline CdSe, MgZnO, or CdS Layers

Journal Article · Mon Jan 15 00:00:00 EST 2018 · Advanced Energy Materials

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1002/aenm.201702666· OSTI ID:1456866

Amarasinghe, Mahisha ^[1]; Colegrove, Eric ^[2]; Moseley, John ^[2]; Moutinho, Helio ^[2]; Albin, David ^[2]; Duenow, Joel ^[2]; Jensen, Soren ^[2]; Kephart, Jason ^[3]; Sampath, Walajabad ^[3]; Sivananthan, Siva ^[1]; Al-Jassim, Mowafak ^[2]; Metzger, Wyatt K. ^[2]

Univ. of Illinois, Chicago, IL (United States)
National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
Colorado State Univ., Fort Collins, CO (United States)

Abstract CdTe solar cells have reached efficiencies comparable to multicrystalline silicon and produce electricity at costs competitive with traditional energy sources. Recent efficiency gains have come partly from shifting from the traditional CdS window layer to new materials such as CdSe and MgZnO, yet substantial headroom still exists to improve performance. Thin film technologies including Cu(In,Ga)Se ₂ , perovskites, Cu ₂ ZnSn(S,Se) ₄ , and CdTe inherently have many grain boundaries that can form recombination centers and impede carrier transport; however, grain boundary engineering has been difficult and not practical. In this work, it is demonstrated that wide columnar grains reaching through the entire CdTe layer can be achieved by aggressive postdeposition CdTe recrystallization. This reduces the grain structure constraints imposed by nucleation on nanocrystalline window layers and enables diverse window layers to be selected for other properties critical for electro‐optical applications. Computational simulations indicate that increasing grain size from 1 to 7 µm can be equivalent to decreasing grain‐boundary recombination velocity by three orders of magnitude. Here, large high‐quality grains enable CdTe lifetimes exceeding 50 ns.

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Research Organization:: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Renewable Power Office. Solar Energy Technologies Office

Grant/Contract Number:: AC36-08GO28308; DE‐AC36‐08GO28308

OSTI ID:: 1456866

Alternate ID(s):: OSTI ID: 1416995

Report Number(s):: NREL/JA-5K00-68612

Journal Information:: Advanced Energy Materials, Vol. 8, Issue 11; ISSN 1614-6832

Publisher:: WileyCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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