• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2009.06a
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• pp.437-437
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• 2009

현재 상용화되어 있는 결정질 태양전지의 경우 높은 실리콘 가격으로 인해 저가화에 어려움을 격고 있다. 따라서 태양전지 저가화의 한 방법으로 박막태양전지가 주목을 받고 있다. P-I-N 구조의 박막태양전지에서 I-layer 각 층의 thickness, activation energy, energy bandgap은 고효율 달성을 위한 중요한 요소이다. 본 논문에서는 박막태양전지 P-I-N layer의 가변을 통하여 고효율을 달성하기 위한 simulation을 수행하였다. 가변 조건으로는 p-layer의 thickness, activation energy 그리고 energy bandgap을 단계별로 변화시켰고 i-layer는 thickness를 n-layer는 thickness와 activation energy를 가변하여 최적의 조건을 찾아 분석하였다. 최종 simulation 결과 p-layer의 thickness 5nm, activation energy 0.3eV 그리고 energy bandgap 1.8eV에서, i-layer thickness 400nm, n-layer thickness 30nm, activation energy 0.2eV에서 최고 효율 11.08%를 달성하였다.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2001.11b
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• pp.525-528
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• 2001

ZnO:Al thin film can be used as a transparent conducting oxide(TCO) which has low electric resistivity and high optical transmittance for the front electrode of amorphous silicon solar cells and display devices. This study of electrical, crystallographic and optical properties of Al doped ZnO thin films prepared by Facing Targets Sputtering(FTS), where strong internal magnets were contained in target holders to confine the plasma between the targets, is described. Optimal transmittance and resistivity was obtained by controlling flow rate of $O_2$ gas and substrate temperature. When the $O_2$ gas rate of 0.3 and substrate temperature $200^{\circ}C$, ZnO:Al thin film had strongly oriented c-axis and lower resistivity( < $10^{-4}{\Omega}-cm$ ).

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2009.11a
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• pp.347-347
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• 2009

결정질 태양전지의 공정에 있어서 호모지니어스(homogeneous)한 구조보다 향상된 변환효율을 얻기 위해 선택적 도핑 방법에 관한 연구가 활발하다. 선택적 도핑 방법이란 에미터(emitter) 층을 $n^{++}$ 영역과 $n^+$ 영역으로 나누어 향상된 전류밀도와 개방전압을 얻기 위한 방법이다. 본 연구에서 제시된 RIE 에치-백 구조는 다수의 선택적 도핑 방법 중 하나이다. 기존의 에치-백 구조는 전면 전극 형성 후 RIE 공정을 수행하기 때문에 전면 전극이 손상되고 RIE 데미지(damage)가 발생되는 문제점이 있었다. 그러나 본 연구에서 제시된 구조는 기존의 에치-백 구조와 달리 RIE 에칭 후 발생된 데미지를 제거하는 추가적인 공정인 질산 패시베이션(nitric acid passivation)이 수행되었다. 또한 본 연구에서 새롭게 제시된 블라킹 마스크 페이스트(blocking mask paste)는 기존의 에치-백 구조에서 발생된 전극 손상 문제를 해결해 주고 있다. 이러한 결과로 호모지니어스 구조보다 향상된 전류밀도 (35.77 mA/$cm^2$), 개방전압 (625 mV), FF (78.01%), 변환효율 (17.43%)를 얻었다.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.540-546
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• 2016

Besides high-efficient photovoltaics based on silicon, polymers, dye-sensitization and hybrid perovskite materials, biomimetic solar cells inspired by a leaf in nature has also been actively studied. As one example, a hydrogel based photovoltaics (HGPV) is a low-cost, environmentally friendly device and requires easy fabrication process. In this paper, the effect of hydroquinone additive on the performance of the HGPV is discussed. The photocurrent increases ~14 times upon the addition of hydroquinone into the agarose hydrogel medium. The photocurrent increase is maximum at the optimum dye concentration, while the photovoltage is barely affected by the dye concentration. The effect of the agarose content in the hydrogel and the types of dyes on the photocurrent is also investigated. Finally, it is shown that the photovoltaic performance of HGPV with hydroquinone can be drastically improved when $TiO_2$ film is deposited on the anode electrode.

• Journal of Energy Engineering
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.243-248
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• 2012

In this study, The report analysed the characteristics of power drop and damage of surface in solar cell through high temperature and humidity test. The solar cells were tested during the 1000hr in $85^{\circ}C$ temperature and 85% humidity conditions, that excerpted standard of PV Module(KS C IEC-61215). An analysis of the cell surface through EL(Electroluminescence), the cell has partly change of surface in yearly. Single-crystalline Solar cell efficiency is decreased from 17.7% to 15.6% and decreasing rate is 11.9%. On the other hand, Poly-crystalline Solar cell efficiency is decreased from 15.5% to 14.0% and decreasing rate is 9.3%. A comparison of the fill factor for analysis of electro characteristic in yearly, Single-crystalline Solar cell efficiency is decreased from 78.7% to 78.1% and decreasing rate is 4.7%. On the other hand, Poly-crystalline Solar cell efficiency is decreased from 78.1% to 76.7% and decreasing rate is 1.8%. Single-crystalline has more bigger power drop than poly-crystalline by the silicon purity and silicon atom arrangement. Also, FF decreasing rate has more bigger drop than efficiency decreasing rate for the reason that the damage of surface by exterior environmental factor is the more influence in cell than other reason that is decreasing FF by damage of p-n junction.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2009.11a
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• pp.127-127
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• 2009

The most important part of the fabrication solar cells is the anti-reflection coating when excludes the kinds of silicon substrates (crystalline, polycrystalline, or amorphous), patterns and materials of electrodes. Anti-reflection coatings reduce the reflection of sunlight and at last increase the intensity of radiation to inside of solar cells. So, we can obtain increase of solar cell efficiency about 10% using anti-reflection coating. There are many kinds of anti-reflection film for solar cell, such as SiN, $SiO_2$, a-Si, and so on. And, they have two functions, anti-reflection and passivation. However such materials could not perfectly prevent reflection. So, in this work, we investigated the anti-reflection coating with the columnar structure ZnO thin film. We synthesized columnar structure ZnO film on glass substrates. The ZnO films were synthesized using a RF magnetron sputtering system with a pure (99.95%) ZnO target at room temperature. The anti-reflection coating layer was sputtered by argon and oxygen gases. The angle of target and substrate measures 0, 20, 40, 60 degrees, the working pressure 10 mtorr and the 250 W of RF power during 40 minutes. The confirm the growth mechanism of ZnO on columnar structure, the anti-reflection coating layer was observed by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM). The optical trends were observed by UV-vis and Elleso meter.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.62 no.2
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• pp.208-212
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• 2013

Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs) have taken much attention due to their low cost and easy fabrication method compare to silicon solar cells. But research on cost effective DSC is prerequisite for commercialization. Fluorine doped tin oxide (FTO) which have been commonly used for electrode substrate as electron collector occupied most percentage of manufacturing cost. Therefore we studied FTO-less DSC using sputtered Ti deposited glass as photoelectrode instead of FTO to reduce manufacturing cost. Ti films sputtered on the glass for different time, 5 to 20 minutes with decreasing sheet resistance as deposition time increases. A light source illuminated to counter electrode in order to overcome opaque Ti films. The efficiency of DSC (Ti20) made Ti sputtered glass for 20 min as photoelectrode was 5.87%. There are no significant difference with conventional cell despite lower manufacturing cost.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2016.02a
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• pp.308-309
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• 2016

Reducing surface recombination is a critical factor for high efficiency silicon solar cells. The passivation process is for reducing dangling bonds which are carrier. Tunnel oxide layer is one of main issues to achieve a good passivation between silicon wafer and emitter layer. Many research use wet-chemical oxidation or thermally grown which the highest conversion efficiencies have been reported so far. In this study, we deposit ultra-thin tunnel oxide layer by PECVD (Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition) using $N_2O$ plasma. Both side deposit tunnel oxide layer in different RF-power and phosphorus doped a-Si:H layer. After deposit, samples are annealed at $850^{\circ}C$ for 1 hour in $N_2$ gas atmosphere. After annealing, samples are measured lifetime and implied Voc (iVoc) by QSSPC (Quasi-Steady-State Photo Conductance). After measure, samples are annealed at $400^{\circ}C$ for 30 minute in $Ar/H_2$ gas atmosphere and then measure again lifetime and implied VOC. The lifetime is increase after all process also implied VOC. The highest results are lifetime $762{\mu}s$, implied Voc 733 mV at RF-power 200 W. The results of C-V measurement shows that Dit is increase when RF-power increase. Using this optimized tunnel oxide layer is attributed to increase iVoc. As a consequence, the cell efficiency is increased such as tunnel mechanism based solar cell application.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.08a
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• pp.254-255
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• 2012

Interest in nano-crystalline silicon (nc-Si) thin films has been growing because of their favorable processing conditions for certain electronic devices. In particular, there has been an increase in the use of nc-Si thin films in photovoltaics for large solar cell panels and in thin film transistors for large flat panel displays. One of the most important material properties for these device applications is the macroscopic charge-carrier mobility. Hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) or nc-Si is a basic material in thin film transistors (TFTs). However, a-Si:H based devices have low carrier mobility and bias instability due to their metastable properties. The large number of trap sites and incomplete hydrogen passivation of a-Si:H film produce limited carrier transport. The basic electrical properties, including the carrier mobility and stability, of nc-Si TFTs might be superior to those of a-Si:H thin film. However, typical nc-Si thin films tend to have mobilities similar to a-Si films, although changes in the processing conditions can enhance the mobility. In polycrystalline silicon (poly-Si) thin films, the performance of the devices is strongly influenced by the boundaries between neighboring crystalline grains. These grain boundaries limit the conductance of macroscopic regions comprised of multiple grains. In much of the work on poly-Si thin films, it was shown that the performance of TFTs was largely determined by the number and location of the grain boundaries within the channel. Hence, efforts were made to reduce the total number of grain boundaries by increasing the average grain size. However, even a small number of grain boundaries can significantly reduce the macroscopic charge carrier mobility. The nano-crystalline or polymorphous-Si development for TFT and solar cells have been employed to compensate for disadvantage inherent to a-Si and micro-crystalline silicon (${\mu}$-Si). Recently, a novel process for deposition of nano-crystralline silicon (nc-Si) thin films at room temperature was developed using neutral beam assisted chemical vapor deposition (NBaCVD) with a neutral particle beam (NPB) source, which controls the energy of incident neutral particles in the range of 1~300 eV in order to enhance the atomic activation and crystalline of thin films at room temperature. In previous our experiments, we verified favorable properties of nc-Si thin films for certain electronic devices. During the formation of the nc-Si thin films by the NBaCVD with various process conditions, NPB energy directly controlled by the reflector bias and effectively increased crystal fraction (~80%) by uniformly distributed nc grains with 3~10 nm size. The more resent work on nc-Si thin film transistors (TFT) was done. We identified the performance of nc-Si TFT active channeal layers. The dependence of the performance of nc-Si TFT on the primary process parameters is explored. Raman, FT-IR and transmission electron microscope (TEM) were used to study the microstructures and the crystalline volume fraction of nc-Si films. The electric properties were investigated on Cr/SiO2/nc-Si metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) capacitors.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2016.02a
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• pp.406-406
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• 2016

To get high efficiency n-type crystalline silicon solar cells, passivation is one of the key factor. Tunnel oxide (SiO2) reduce surface recombination as a passivation layer and it does not constrict the majority carrier flow. In this work, the passivation quality enhanced by different chemical solution such as HNO3, H2SO4:H2O2 and DI-water to make thin tunnel oxide layer on n-type crystalline silicon wafer and changes of characteristics by subsequent annealing process and firing process after phosphorus doped amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) deposition. The tunneling of carrier through oxide layer is checked through I-V measurement when the voltage is from -1 V to 1 V and interface state density also be calculated about $1{\times}1012cm-2eV-1$ using MIS (Metal-Insulator-Semiconductor) structure . Tunnel oxide produced by 68 wt% HNO3 for 5 min on $100^{\circ}C$, H2SO4:H2O2 for 5 min on $100^{\circ}C$ and DI-water for 60 min on $95^{\circ}C$. The oxide layer is measured thickness about 1.4~2.2 nm by spectral ellipsometry (SE) and properties as passivation layer by QSSPC (Quasi-Steady-state Photo Conductance). Tunnel oxide layer is capped with phosphorus doped amorphous silicon on both sides and additional annealing process improve lifetime from $3.25{\mu}s$ to $397{\mu}s$ and implied Voc from 544 mV to 690 mV after P-doped a-Si deposition, respectively. It will be expected that amorphous silicon is changed to poly silicon phase. Furthermore, lifetime and implied Voc were recovered by forming gas annealing (FGA) after firing process from $192{\mu}s$ to $786{\mu}s$. It is shown that the tunnel oxide layer is thermally stable.