Development of alternative thin film photovoltaic technologies is an important research topic because of the potential of low‐cost, high‐efficiency solar cells to produce terawatt levels of clean power. However, this development of unexplored yet promising absorbers can be hindered by complications that arise during solar cell fabrication. Here, a high‐throughput combinatorial method is applied to accelerate development of photovoltaic devices, in this case, using the novel CuSbS 2 absorber via a newly developed three‐stage self‐regulated growth process to control absorber purity and orientation. Photovoltaic performance of the absorber, using the typical substrate CuIn x Ga 1 −  x Se 2 (CIGS) device architecture, is explored as a function of absorber quality and thickness using a variety of back contacts. This study yields CuSbS 2 device prototypes with ~1% conversion efficiency, suggesting that the optimal CuSbS 2 device fabrication parameters and contact selection criteria are quite different than for CIGS, despite the similarity of these two absorbers. The CuSbS 2 device efficiency is at present limited by low short‐circuit current because of bulk recombination related to defects, and a small open‐circuit voltage because of a theoretically predicted cliff‐type conduction band offset between CuSbS 2 and CdS. Overall, these results illustrate both the potential and limits of combinatorial methods to accelerate the development of thin film photovoltaic devices using novel absorbers. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. High‐throughput combinatorial methods are applied to accelerate the development of photovoltaic devices with novel CuSbS 2 absorbers. A three‐stage self‐regulated growth process is developed and used to control absorber purity and orientation. Photovoltaic performance is explored as a function of absorber purity, orientation, and thickness, using a variety of back contacts. This study yields CuSbS 2 device prototypes with ~1% efficiency. Overall, this paper illustrates how combinatorial methods can accelerate the development of thin‐film photovoltaic devices with novel absorbers.


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    Title :

    Accelerated development of CuSbS2 thin film photovoltaic device prototypes



    Published in:

    Publication date :

    2016




    Type of media :

    Article (Journal)


    Type of material :

    Print


    Language :

    English



    Classification :

    BKL:    53.36 Energiedirektumwandler, elektrische Energiespeicher