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Abundance of antimony in the earth's upper crust is near 0.2 ppm, with an annual production nearly two hundred thousand tons, and 99.65% ingot price below US$15/kg, thus making antimony-based semiconductor compounds attractive for solar cells. The optical band gap (Eg) 1.5-1.8 eV of antimony sulfide qualifies it as a solar cell absorber, particularly in view of the solid solutions Sb2Se3-xSe with Eg 1-1.8 eV. We report here chemical deposition Sb2S3 of 300 nm in thickness using two methods. When used in CdS/Sb2S3/C-Ag cells prepared by either method, Voc is up to 640 mV and Jsc, 2-5 mA/cm2 and efficiency, η is 0.5-1% under 1000 W/m2 AM 1.5 G sunlight. Under concentrated sunlight, Jsc increases proportionately and Voc, logarithmically. Addition of a 400 nm of PbS thin film: CdS/Sb2S3/PbS/C-Ag improves Voc, but cell efficiency is 1%.

Attractive optical and electrical properties of tin chalcogenides, along with the abundance of Sn in the earth's crust project themselves as alternate p-type absorber materials in thin-film photovoltaic technologies. Cell structures prepared with SnS (ZB) of 500 nm and colloidal graphite paint as back contact showed a Voc of 344 mV, Jsc of 3.1 mA/cm2 with a fill factor FF of 0.37 and conversion efficiency η of 0.57 %. In SnO2:F/CdS/Sb2S3/SnSe cells prepared with an evaporated SnSe film, Voc of 607 mV, Jsc 3.9 mA/cm2 FF 0.26 and η of 0.61 % is obtained. We present here the details of the cell preparation and their characteristics.

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