High Volume Pilot Production of High Efficiency PERC Solar Cells-Analysis Based on Device Simulation

In this work we compare experimental results of an industrial passivated emitter and rear cell (PERC) high volume pilot line production in the SolarWorld Innovations technology center with a simulation model based on 2D Sentaurus Device Simulations The PERC solar cell design shows in a well-controlled experiment a 1.1% absolute higher median efficiency compared to the aluminium back surface field (Al-BSF) solar cell reference group. We derive a calibrated simulation model by the characterization of cells and test structures. We show that the simulation model reproduces well the measured I-V data. In consequence this enables us to estimate the solar cell performance when an applied process or silicon wafer parameters will be changed for further optimization. In the second part of this study we investigate the impact of front and rear side recombination on the solar cell parameters by simulation and sensitivity analysis. We show that the quality of the local BSF underneath the local rear contacts has an important impact on the electrical solar cell performance.