Excellent thermal stability of remote plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposited silicon nitride films for the rear of screen-printed bifacial siliconsolar cells

In this work the thermal stability of the electronic surface passivation of remote plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposited (RPECVD) silicon nitride (SiN) films is investigated with the aim to establish a cost-effective scre en-printing and firing-through-the-SiN process for bifacial silicon (Si) so lar cells. As a key result, RPECVD SiN films provide an excellently thermal ly stable surface passivation quality if they feature a refractive index in the range between 2.0 and 2.2 After a short anneal above 850 degreesC the surface recombination velocity on 1.5 Ohm cm p-type float-zone (FZ) Si rema ins at a very low level of about 20 cm/s. First bifacial silicon solar cell s with screen-printed rear contacts on 1.5 Ohm cm p-type FZ Si yield a very promising rear efficiency of 13.4%. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rig hts reserved.