Annealing of Silicon Heterojunction Solar Cells: Interplay of Solar Cell and Indium Tin Oxide Properties

Jan Haschke*, Raphaël Lemerle, Brahim Aïssa, Amir A. Abdallah, Maulid M. Kivambe, Mathieu Boccard, Christophe Ballif

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

47 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

In this paper, we report the evolution of silicon heterojunction solar cell properties focusing, in particular, on the indium tin oxide (ITO) layers upon consecutive thermal annealing. We find that the charge carrier density Ne of the ITO increases with higher thermal budget, while the carrier mobility remains constant. For the solar cells, their series resistance at the maximum power point RMPPS first decreases due to the reduction of the ITO's sheet resistance. With further annealing, RMPPS increases again. As all monitored RS components decrease, we attribute this to an increase of the contact resistance. The implied VOC and the implied fill factor both slightly degrade for annealing temperatures above 190 °C for our layers. This, as well as the change in Ne of the ITO, must be carefully considered when optimizing the thermal budget needed, e.g., for sputter damage or screen-printing paste curing.

Original languageEnglish
Article number8771183
Pages (from-to)1202-1207
Number of pages6
JournalIEEE Journal of Photovoltaics
Volume9
Issue number5
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Sept 2019

Keywords

  • Indium tin oxide (ITO)
  • loss analysis
  • refractive index
  • selectivity
  • series resistance
  • silicon heterojunction (SHJ)
  • sputter damage

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