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In this paper, we investigate tandem amorphous/microcrystalline silicon solar cells with asymmetric intermediate reflectors grown in the n–i–p substrate configuration. We compare different types of substrates with respect to their light-trapping properties as well as their influence on the growth of single-junction microcrystalline cells. Our most promising back reflector combines a textured zinc oxide film grown by low-pressure chemical vapor deposition, a silver film for reflection, and a zinc oxide buffer layer. Grown on this substrate, microcrystalline cells exhibit excellent response in the infrared while keeping high open-circuit voltage and fill factor, leading to efficiencies of up to 10.0%. After optimizing the morphology of the asymmetric intermediate reflector, we achieve an n–i–p micromorph solar cell stabilized efficiency of 11.6%, using 270 nm and 1.7 mm of silicon for the absorber layer of the amorphous top cell and the microcrystalline bottom cell, respectively. Using this original device architecture, we reach efficiencies close to those of state-of-the-art n–i–p and p–i–n micromorph devices, demonstrating a promising route to deposit high-efficiency thin-film silicon solar cells on opaque substrates.

This contribution reviews some of the latest achievements and challenges in thin-film silicon photovoltaic (PV) technology based on amorphous and nanocrystalline silicon and their alloys. We address material and device developments, including (i) improved plasma deposition processes to achieve high-quality dense absorber materials; (ii) absorber layers based on silicon tetrafluoride, which lead to enhanced absorption in the near-infrared and yield outstanding short-circuit current densities; (iii) dedicated optimization of the interfaces and device architecture, as well as (iv) enhanced light harvesting by means of multi-scale textured substrates and reduced parasitic absorption in the non-active layers. This paper will describe how, by combining all of these advances along with precise control of plasmas over large areas, key results have been achieved in recent years, at both the cell and large-area module level, with stabilized efficiencies of over 13 and 12%, respectively.

The use of intrinsic silicon oxide as a buffer layer at the p-i interface of thin-film silicon solar cells is shown to provide significant advantages. For microcrystalline silicon solar cells, when associated with highly crystalline i-layers deposited at high rates, all electrical parameters are improved. Larger efficiency gains are achieved with substrates of increased roughness. For cells with an improved i-layer material quality, there is mainly a gain in short-circuit current density. An improvement in carrier collection in the blue region of the spectrum is systematically observed on all the cells. The presence of a silicon oxide buffer layer also promotes the nucleation of the subsequent intrinsic microcrystalline silicon layer. In amorphous silicon solar cells, the silicon oxide buffer layer is proven to act as an efficient barrier to boron cross-contamination, eliminating the need for additional processing steps (e.g. water vapor flush), while providing a wide bandgap material at the interface. The implementation of silicon oxide buffer layers for both types of cells thus provides a decisive improvement, as it allows extremely fast deposition of the full p-i-n stack of layers of the cell in a single-chamber configuration while providing a high-quality substrate-resilient p-i interface. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.