High-Performance and Traditional Multicrystalline Silicon: Comparing Gettering Responses and Lifetime-Limiting Defects

In recent years, high-performance multicrystalline silicon (HPMC-Si) has emerged as an attractive alternative to traditional ingot-based multicrystalline silicon (mc-Si), with a similar cost structure but improved cell performance. Herein, we evaluate the gettering response of traditional mc-Si and...

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Published in:IEEE journal of photovoltaics 2016-05, Vol.6 (3), p.632-640
Main Authors: Castellanos, Sergio, Ekstrom, Kai E., Autruffe, Antoine, Jensen, Mallory A., Morishige, Ashley E., Hofstetter, Jasmin, Yen, Patricia, Lai, Barry, Stokkan, Gaute, del Canizo, Carlos, Buonassisi, Tonio
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Clusters
Cooling
Crystal defects
Defects
dislocation recombination activity
Dislocations
Dissolution
eccentricity variation
Gettering
Grain boundaries
high-performance multicrystalline silicon (HPMC-Si)
Interstitials
Iron
minority-carrier lifetime
Photovoltaic systems
photovoltaics
recombination
Silicon
SOLAR ENERGY
synchrotron
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Summary:In recent years, high-performance multicrystalline silicon (HPMC-Si) has emerged as an attractive alternative to traditional ingot-based multicrystalline silicon (mc-Si), with a similar cost structure but improved cell performance. Herein, we evaluate the gettering response of traditional mc-Si and HPMC-Si. Microanalytical techniques demonstrate that HPMC-Si and mc-Si share similar lifetime-limiting defect types but have different relative concentrations and distributions. HPMC-Si shows a substantial lifetime improvement after P-gettering compared with mc-Si, chiefly because of lower area fraction of dislocation-rich clusters. In both materials, the dislocation clusters and grain boundaries were associated with relatively higher interstitial iron point-defect concentrations after diffusion, which is suggestive of dissolving metal-impurity precipitates. The relatively fewer dislocation clusters in HPMC-Si are shown to exhibit similar characteristics to those found in mc-Si. Given similar governing principles, a proxy to determine relative recombination activity of dislocation clusters developed for mc-Si is successfully transferred to HPMC-Si. The lifetime in the remainder of HPMC-Si material is found to be limited by grain-boundary recombination. To reduce the recombination activity of grain boundaries in HPMC-Si, coordinated impurity control during growth, gettering, and passivation must be developed.
ISSN:2156-3381
2156-3403
DOI:10.1109/JPHOTOV.2016.2540246