Possible top cells for next-generation Si-based tandem solar cells
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REVIEW ARTICLE
Possible top cells for next-generation Si-based tandem solar cells Shuaicheng LU, Chao CHEN (✉), Jiang TANG Sargent Joint Research Center, Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics (WNLO), School of Optical and Electronic Information, Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST), Wuhan 430074, China
© Higher Education Press 2020
Abstract Si-based solar cells, which have the advantages of high efficiency, low manufacturing costs, and outstanding stability, are dominant in the photovoltaic market. Currently, state-of-the-art Si-based solar cells are approaching the practical limit of efficiency. Constructing Si-based tandem solar cells is one available pathway to break the theoretical efficiency limit of single-junction silicon solar cells. Various top cells have been explored recently in the construction of Si-based tandem devices. Nevertheless, many challenges still stand in the way of extensive commercial application of Si-based tandem solar cells. Herein, we summarize the recent progress of representative Si-based tandem solar cells with different top cells, such as III-V solar cells, wide-bandgap perovskite solar cells, cadmium telluride (CdTe)-related solar cells, Cu(In,Ga)(Se,S)2 (CIGS)-related solar cells, and amorphous silicon (a-Si) solar cells, and we analyze the main bottlenecks for their next steps of development. Subsequently, we suggest several potential candidate top cells for Si-based tandem devices, such as Sb2S3, Se, CdSe, and Cu2O. These materials have great potential for the development of high-performance and low-cost Si-based tandem solar cells in the future. Keywords photovoltaic market, Si-based solar cell, efficiency limit, tandem, top cell
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Introduction
As global environmental pollution and the energy crisis are increasing, renewable energy sources are playing a more important role in people’s daily lives. Solar cells, which convert solar energy into electricity directly without extra
Received May 24, 2020; accepted June 14, 2020 E-mail: [email protected]
pollution, have attracted extensive attention over the years. The photovoltaic market has developed rapidly with exponentially grown installed capacity. As shown in Fig. 1(a), the global cumulative installed capacity was only 173 MWp in 1996 but reached 392 GWp in 2017 with a > 40% compound annual growth rate [1]. Notably, in the past few years, crystalline Si (c-Si) technology, including monocrystalline Si (mono-Si) and multicrystalline Si (multi-Si), has dominated the photovoltaic market with > 90% of global annual production, and this has resulted in a gradual increasing market share [2]. In contrast, thin-film technologies, such as cadmium telluride (CdTe) and Cu(In,Ga)(Se,S)2 (CIGS), possess only 5% of global annual production with 4.5 GWp of installed capacity in 2017 [2]. Until the fourth quarter of 2017, the estimated cumulative production of c-Si photovoltaic modules was ~405 GWp, which is much larger than ~33 GWp for thin-film photovoltaic modules (Fig. 1(b)) [2]. Additionally, owing to the opti
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