The formation mechanism for printed silver-contacts for silicon solar cells

Jeremy D. Fields, Md. Imteyaz Ahmad, Vanessa L. Pool, Jiafan Yu, Douglas G. Van Campen, Philip A. Parilla, Michael F. Toney () and Maikel F. A. M. van Hest ()
Additional contact information
Jeremy D. Fields: National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Md. Imteyaz Ahmad: SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
Vanessa L. Pool: SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
Jiafan Yu: Stanford University
Douglas G. Van Campen: SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
Philip A. Parilla: National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Michael F. Toney: SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
Maikel F. A. M. van Hest: National Renewable Energy Laboratory

Nature Communications, 2016, vol. 7, issue 1, 1-7

Abstract: Abstract Screen-printing provides an economically attractive means for making Ag electrical contacts to Si solar cells, but the use of Ag substantiates a significant manufacturing cost, and the glass frit used in the paste to enable contact formation contains Pb. To achieve optimal electrical performance and to develop pastes with alternative, abundant and non-toxic materials, a better understanding the contact formation process during firing is required. Here, we use in situ X-ray diffraction during firing to reveal the reaction sequence. The findings suggest that between 500 and 650 °C PbO in the frit etches the SiNx antireflective-coating on the solar cell, exposing the Si surface. Then, above 650 °C, Ag+ dissolves into the molten glass frit – key for enabling deposition of metallic Ag on the emitter surface and precipitation of Ag nanocrystals within the glass. Ultimately, this work clarifies contact formation mechanisms and suggests approaches for development of inexpensive, nontoxic solar cell contacting pastes.

Date: 2016
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms11143 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:7:y:2016:i:1:d:10.1038_ncomms11143

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/ncomms11143

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().