Polycrystalline Thin Film Photovoltaics: Research, Development, and Technologies: Preprint

Conference · Wed May 01 00:00:00 EDT 2002

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1109/PVSC.2002.1190562· OSTI ID:15007048

Ullal, H S; Zweibel, K; von Roedern, B

II-VI binary thin-film solar cells based on cadmium telluride (CdTe) and I-III-VI ternary thin-film solar cells based on copper indium diselenide (CIS) and related materials have been the subject of intense research and development in the past few years. Substantial progress has been made thus far in the area of materials research, device fabrication, and technology development, and numerous applications based on CdTe and CIS have been deployed worldwide. World record efficiency of 16.5% has been achieved by NREL scientists for a thin-film CdTe solar cell using a modified device structure. Also, NREL scientists achieved world-record efficiency of 21.1% for a thin-film CIGS solar cell under a 14X concentration and AM1.5 global spectrum. When measured under a AM1.5 direct spectrum, the efficiency increases to 21.5%. Pathways for achieving 25% efficiency for tandem polycrystalline thin-film solar cells are elucidated. R&D issues relating to CdTe and CIS are reported in this paper, such as contact stability and accelerated life testing in CdTe, and effects of moisture ingress in thin-film CIS devices. Substantial technology development is currently under way, with various groups reporting power module efficiencies in the range of 7.0% to 12.1% and power output of 40.0 to 92.5 W. A number of lessons learned during the scale-up activities of the technology development for fabrication of thin-film power modules are discussed. The major global players actively involved in the technology development and commercialization efforts using both rigid and flexible power modules are highlighted.

• Research Organization: National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: US Department of Energy (US)
• DOE Contract Number: AC36-99-GO10337
• OSTI ID: 15007048
• Report Number(s): NREL/CP-520-32187; TRN: US200413%%97
• Resource Relation: Conference: Conference title not supplied, Conference location not supplied, Conference dates not supplied; Other Information: PBD: 1 May 2002; Related Information: Prepared for the 29th IEEE PV Specialists Conference, 20-24 May
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

14 SOLAR ENERGY
36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
CADMIUM TELLURIDES
COMMERCIALIZATION
COPPER
EFFICIENCY
FABRICATION
INDIUM
MOISTURE
SOLAR CELLS
STABILITY
TESTING
THIN FILMS
PV
II-VI BINARY
THIN-FILM SOLAR CELLS
CADMIUM TELLURIDE (CDTE)
I-III-VI TERNARY THIN-FILM
COPPER INDIUM DISELENIDE (CIS)
DEVICE FABRICATION
POWER MODULES
SOLAR ENERGY - PHOTOVOLTAICS