Thin-film Silicon Solar Cells on Dry Etched Textured Glass

In this work, we report on the development of thin-film silicon solar cells on textured glass substrates. The textured glass substrates are fabricated by ion beam etching using a wet-chemically textured three-dimensional etching mask. The development of transparent and conductive front contact ZnO:Al films on textured glass is presented. The optimum of the front contact layer thickness was found to be 60 nm. For this thickness deteriorating reflection maxima are avoided, which occur due to the interferences in the front contact layer. The glass texture is adjusted to achieve better light trapping in the near infrared range. In addition, ITO instead of ZnO:Al film was investigated to surpass the decreased fill factor of solar cells deposited on ZnO:Al thin front contacts.