SILICON COMPOSITE FILMS AS AN ANTI-REFLECTION COATING LAYER FOR THIRD GENERATION PHOTOVOLTAIC
Keywords:
Anti-reflection coating, silicon ink, phosphosilicate glass, silicon composite filmAbstract
Anti-reflection coating (ARC) layer is a thin dielectric layer to be useful on the surface of photovoltaic cells due to its supportable reduced carrier recombination. The silicon composite film acts as an ARC layer that can collect the desired light wavelength. In this work, silicon composite ink (Si-ink) consisting of silicon powder and phospho-silicate glass solution (PSG-sol) was prepared by the sol-gel technique at the low temperature. Silicon powder at the average diameter of around 4 microns was produced in-house by grinding technique. Silicon composite films were formed on quartz substrates by spin coating technique. The effects of the varying Si concentrations on the electrical resistivity, and the optical, properties were studied to find the optimal Si dense. It is found that the Si composite films provide the basal absorption edge shifting to the higher energy along with the decrease of Si dense, and also the optical band gap of Si composite films computed by Tauc plot were shown the expanding value to the higher energy from 1.2 eV to 1.7 eV. The refractive index and extinction coefficient of the Si composite films are much lower than Si bulk. The refractive index of the Si composite film can be adjustable by varying the Si dense. The optimal Si composite conditions are in the ratio of PSG-sol:Si as 1:0.050 and 1:0.025 to provide good dielectric, low reflectance, high absorbance properties. The Si composite film with PSG matrix can be a promising approach for ARC layer in the third-generation solar cells.
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