Thin tantalum-silicon-oxygen/tantalum-silicon-nitrogen films as high-efficiency humidity diffusion barriers for solar cell encapsulation

CIS solar modules were coated with tantalum-based barrier layers. The performance of the thin-film barrier encapsulation was determined by measuring the remaining module efficiency after a 1000 h accelerated aging test. A significantly enhanced stability against humidity diffusion in comparison to non-encapsulated modules was reached with a reactively sputtered thin-film system consisting of 250 nm Ta-Si-O and 15 nm Ta-Si-N.