High current, thin silicon-on-ceramic solar cell

Solar cells utilizing thin-film polycrystalline silicon can achieve photovo ltaic power conversion efficiencies greater than 19%. These high efficienci es are a result of light trapping and back surface passivation. Optimum sil icon thickness, for devices employing such technology, has been determined to be 20 mum (Blakers et al., Appl. Phys. Lett. 60 (1992) 2572) to 35 mum ( Rand et al., Proceedings of the IEEE Photovoltaic Specialist Conference, Or lando, FL, May 1990, p. 263. Low cost is achieved by minimizing the require d amount of silicon feedstock per watt of power output. The use of an elect rically insulating supporting substrate allows for monolithic, series conne cted sub-modules. A solar cell with a 20 mum thick polycrystalline Si-layer on a ceramic substrate, utilizing both light trapping and back-surface pas sivation, was fabricated and characterized. A short-circuit current of 25.8 mA/cm(2) was measured and verified by the National Renewable Energy Labora tory(NREL). (C) 2001 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved .