Minority-carrier lifetime and efficiency of Cu(In,Ga)Se-2 solar cells

Room-temperature recombination dynamics has been investigated in a large se t of different Cu(In,Ga)Se-2 absorber films and compared to the electrical device characteristics of the respective solar cell modules. For a given ce ll preparation process, a characteristic relation between the low-injection minority-carrier lifetime of the absorber layers and the conversion effici ency of the solar cells is observed: Long lifetimes correlate with high ope n circuit voltages and conversion efficiencies, while no significant influe nce of the lifetime on the short circuit current is found. (C) 1998 America n Institute of Physics. [S0003-6951(98)01635-0].