EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Solar Cells Fabrication

Technologies

Crystalline Si Cell Technologies

Amorphous Si Cell Technologies
Thin Film Cell Technologies

For a comprehensive tutorial on solar cells in general,

see www.udel.edu/igert/pvcdrom

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EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Global Energy Sources projection

Source: World Energy Council

Professor N Cheung, U.C. Berkeley
EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

The Growth Rate Captures the Attention

Professor N Cheung, U.C. Berkeley Source: AMAT 3

EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Solar Facts

The earth receives more energy from the sun in just

one hour than the world uses in a whole year.

1% of the land today used for crops and pasture could

supply the world's total energy consumption.

The Sun provides 1020 Watts/meter peak power at sea-

level

Cell efficiency of 10% translates to ~100W/meter2

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EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Commonly Known Solar Cell Materials

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EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Fraunhofer

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EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Beside efficiency, there are other considerations for ultilization

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Projected Module Cost

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EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Energy Content

EG silicon ~ 200 kWh/kg

Solar Grade Si ~ 50kWh/kg
MG silicon ~ 20kWh/kg

Energy Payback time

Monocrystalline Si cell ~ 4 years

Polycrystalline Si cell 1.6 to 2.7 years
Amorphous Si cell 0.9 to 1.6 years.

Richard Corkish ,Solar Progress, (1997)

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Professor N Cheung, U.C. Berkeley
EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Comparison of commercial PV
Crystalline Amorphous
CIGS CdTe Organic
Silicon Silicon
Conversion
13-18% 5-10% 10-12% 10.5% 5%
Efficiency
$1.3
Current cost $0.6
$2.5-3.5 $2-2.5 <$1
per Watt* (predict)
(predict)
Material
No Silane Indium Te(?) No
Shortage
Toxic Cadmium Cadmium
NA NA NA
Substance Selenium Tellurium

Reliability Excellent Fair Good Good Poor

Company in Suntech, AMAT, Nanosolar,

First Solar Konarka
the field SunPower Dupont Solyndra

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EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Si Crystalline Solar cells

are just large area semiconductor diodes

Crystalline solar cells are

usually wafers, about 0.3
mm thick, sawn from Si
ingot

15% efficiency cells deliver

15 to 60 W/m or 0.45-1.35
kWh/m/day (annual day and
night average) in North
America

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EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

From Ingot to Module

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From Ingot to Module (cont.)

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From Sand to Silicon

Process generates four tons of silicon tetrachloride

liquid waste for each ton of polysilicon produced.
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Minimize Kerf Loss

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Generic Crystalline Si Cell Processing

Al-Ag paste

* Al-Ag fuses through SiNx to form ohmic contact

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Backside Al contact

(BSF= back surface field p+ layer)

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Belt Furnace

Max T =950C

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50 MW fab cell line.

(Source: Applied Materials)

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Antireflection Coating Materials

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Diagnosis of Crystalline-Silicon Solar- Cells Utilizing Electroluminescence: save

production costs by sorting out defective solar-cells in an early stage

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Module
Packaging

Source: Spire Corp

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Crystalline Si on Glass (CSG) Solar Cell

* All fabrication done with Laser processing and low-temperature PECVD

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EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Sliver Cell

A wafer (assume 150mm diameter) configured as a conventional solar cell has an area
of 177cm2. However, the same wafer, when processed to produce Sliver cells, can be
used to cover up to 5,000 cm2 of module area, which is 30 times better than for
conventional technology.

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Motivation for amorphous Si Cell

Both silicon and thin-film PV solutions require a

reduction in cost/watt. (Source: Applied
Materials)
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EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Rigid and Flexible a-Si Solar Cells

30% T Ag
n- a-Si:H
i- a-Si:H

Glass p- a-
Opaque
Textured SiC:H ZnO (SS/Kapton)
TCO
Glass / TCO / p / i / n / Ag SS / ZnO / p / i / n /Ag
Voc Doped layers
Jsc i-layer defect Voc Jsc FF
density Cell efficiency, h =
Light trapping Pin

FF i-layer defect density

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EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Amorphous Si Deposition

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Amorphous Si Deposition

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a-Si Cell Manufacturing

Source: ULVAC Solar

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Conceptual a-Si Cell Fab

Source: AMAT
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CIGS Solar Cells

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CIGS Manufacturing

Source: pmc.org.tw
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Roll-to-Roll Manufacturing

Source: Ascent Solar

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Needs MBE , MOCVD, or Layer Transfer

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c-Si
Technology Evolution thin film
"New Concepts"

MW GW
30%p.a. 25%p.a.
3500 140
3000 120
2500 100
2000 80
1500 60
1000 40
500 20
0 2002 2005 2010 2015 2020 2025 2030
0

RENEWABLE ENERGY FOR EUROPE - RESEARCH IN ACTION

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EE143 F2010 Lecture 26

Q: What are the major differences between

PV fabrication and IC/MEMS fabrication ?

Patterning (alignment, size control)

Doping
Contact Formation
Metallization
Planarization

Q: What other process modules are not

commonly used in IC/MEMS fabrication ?
Professor N Cheung, U.C. Berkeley