Evaluating the Performance and Reliability of Screen-Printable Fire-Through Copper Paste on PERC Solar Cells

Conference · Thu Oct 10 04:00:00 EDT 2024

OSTI ID:2472503

Mitra, Suchismita; Nemeth, Bill; Johnston, Steve; Guthrey, Harvey; Hacke, Peter; Dharmadasa, Ruvini; Druffel, Thad; Elmer, Kevin; Nambo, Apolo; Williams, Dustin; Upadhyaya, Ajay; Upadhyaya, Vijaykumar D.; Rohatgi, Ajeet; Stradins, Paul

A bifacial silicon heterojunction solar cell demands approximately 210 mg usage of silver paste (9 busbars, 24.5%, bifacial, M6 size wafer). Copper is an excellent alternative to silver: 100x cheaper, similar elecvtrical resistivities, and 1000x more abundant. Successful demonstration of large area selective emitter PERC solar cells using Cu fire-through paste with FF approximately 75% and approximately 19%. Paste chemistry results in oxide-based Cu diffusion barrier, leading to good reliability of the devices: 1000h DHT giving a 3.5% efficiency drop. The additional series resistance still needs to be lowered. Printed and fired cell performance is governed mostly by pFF, especially J02 ; same for DHT degradation. Further improvement in printing and firing optimization for lower series resistance and higher FF.

• 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, Durable Modules Consortium (DuraMAT)
• DOE Contract Number: AC36-08GO28308
• OSTI ID: 2472503
• Report Number(s): NREL/PR-5900-90444; MainId:92222; UUID:f80350a4-c7e3-4c2f-9b83-e779d052c374; MainAdminId:73984
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

Ag
Cu
EDS
MATERIALS SCIENCE
SOLAR ENERGY
PERC
PV
copper
energy-dispersive x-ray spectroscopy
fire-through
photovoltaic
screen-printable
silver
solar cell