Process development of amorphous silicon crystalline silicon solar cells

We have already investigated some crucial limiting process steps of the amorphous silicon (a-Si)/crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar cell technology and some specific characterization tools of the ultrathin amorphous material used in devices. In this work, we focus our attention particularly on the technology of the ITO front contact fabrication, that also is used as an antireflective coating. II is pointed out that this layer acts as a barrier layer against the diffusion of metal during the annealing treatments of the front contact grid. The criteria of the selection of the metal to be used to obtain good performance of the grid and the deposition methods best suited to the purpose are shown. We were able to fabricate low temperature heterojunction solar cells based p-type Czochralski silicon, and a conversion efficiency of 14.7% on 3.8 cm(2) area was obtained without back surface field and texturization.