GaAs Thermophotovoltaic Patterned Dielectric Back Contact Devices with Improved Sub-Bandgap Reflectance

Journal Article · Thu Feb 03 00:00:00 EST 2022 · Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.solmat.2021.111545· OSTI ID:1845962

Arulanandam, Madhan K.; Steiner, Myles A. ; Tervo, Eric J. ; Young, Alexandra R.; Kuritzky, Leah Y.; Perl, Emmett E.; Narayan, Tarun C.; Kayes, Brendan M.; Briggs, Justin A.; King, Richard R.

We demonstrate GaAs thermophotovoltaic (TPV) devices with a patterned dielectric back contact (PDBC) architecture, featuring a dielectric spacer between the semiconductor and back metal contact over most of the back surface for high reflectance, and metal point contacts over a smaller area for electrical conduction. In the TPV application, high sub-bandgap reflectance is needed to reflect unused sub-bandgap photons to the thermal emitter to minimize energy losses in this portion of the thermal spectrum. We explore different PDBC fabrication processes with SU-8 and SiO2 dielectric spacer layers to maximize sub-bandgap reflectance while minimizing series resistance to increase TPV conversion efficiency. We successfully demonstrate GaAs SU-8 PDBC TPV devices with 2200 degrees C blackbody-weighted sub-bandgap reflectance of 94.9% and 96.5% with and without a front metal grid, respectively. This is 0.7% and 2.3% (absolute) higher than the mean sub-bandgap reflectance of 94.2% for GaAs baseline TPV devices with 100% Au back contact with front metal grid. Lower sub-bandgap reflectance in TPV devices with front grids indicates the front grid induces light scattering leading to additional parasitic absorption in the TPV device. We also show that for higher contact coverage fractions, the PDBC reflectance cannot in general be treated by a linear interpolation using simple 1D transfer matrix method modeling and should be treated instead as a diffraction grating by solving Maxwell's equations in 3D.

• Research Organization: National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Advanced Research Projects Agency - Energy (ARPA-E)
• DOE Contract Number: AC36-08GO28308
• OSTI ID: 1845962
• Report Number(s): NREL/JA-5900-80848; MainId:78626; UUID:7eb73259-299e-4ecf-a08c-828515cce285; MainAdminID:62967
• Journal Information: Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells, Vol. 238
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

ENERGY STORAGE
SOLAR ENERGY
energy storage
III-V
patterned dielectric
photovoltaics
PV
series resistance
sub-bandgap deflectance
thermophotovoltaics