Solar Energy 78 (2005) 243250 www.elsevier.

com/locate/solener

Photovoltaic solar cells performance at elevated temperatures

David Meneses-Rodr guez a, Paul P. Horley a, Jess Gonzlez-Hernndez a, u a a a,* b,1 Yuri V. Vorobiev , Peter N. Gorley
b a Unidad Queretaro of CINVESTAV, Libramiento Norponiente 2000, Queretaro 76230, QRO., Mexico Department of Physical Electronics, Chernivtsi National University, 2 Kotsyubynsky st., 274012 Chernivtsi, Ukraine

Received 22 July 2003; received in revised form 21 May 2004; accepted 25 May 2004 Available online 20 July 2004 Communicated by: Associate Editor T.M. Razykov

Abstract It is well known that eciency of photovoltaic solar cells decreases with an increase of temperature, and cooling is necessary at high illumination conditions such as concentrated sunlight, or cosmic or tropical conditions. The purpose of present study was to investigate the opposite option: to make a cell work at relatively high temperature (around 100 200 C) and use the excessive heat in a hybrid system of some kind to increase the total eciency of solar energy utilization. We studied the temperature dependence of the solar cell parameters both theoretically and experimentally, for the basic cells with pn junction and the Schottky barrier, taking account of the dierent carrier transport mechanisms and recombination parameters of the cell material. The possibility of usage of the concentrated sunlight was also taken into account. The experiments conducted in the temperature interval of 25170 C and the calculated data show a real possibility of construction of a two-stage solar-to-electric energy converter with high-temperature second stage, having the overall conversion eciency of 3040%. 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Solar cell eciency; Temperature dependence; Eect of structure and material

1. Introduction It is well known that the eciency of photovoltaic solar cells decreases with an increase of temperature, this decrease is determined rst of all by the drop of opencircuit cell voltage (see, for example, Sze, 1981), therefore an ecient performance of PV cells in conditions, for example, of concentrated sunlight, demands cooling. The earlier theoretical studies (Wysocki and Rappaport, 1960) have shown that this decrease is inevitable, but the actual temperature coecient of the eciency depends

Corresponding author. Tel.: +52-442-441-4916; fax: +52442-441-4938.. E-mail addresses: vorobiev@qro.cinvestav.mx (Y.V. Vorobiev), gorley@west.com.ua (P.N. Gorley). 1 Tel.: +380-3725-98473.

on the carrier transport mechanism, and in dierent cases (ideal current or recombination one) could dier by several times; the eects of recombination normally enhance the eciency variation with temperature. Numerous subsequent studies (Green et al., 1982, Osterwald et al., 1987, Friedman, 1996, Nann and Emery, 1992, etc.) presented results of measurements and calculations of the temperature coecients of solar cells parameters in dierent approximations. However, all the studies mentioned (and the other known to the authors) are related to relatively narrow temperature range (2580 C). On the other hand, there are cases (like cosmic conditions, Torchynska, 1998) when the cell cooling could be impossible or very expensive, and the actual cell temperature is well in excess of 100 C. Thus it is important to know which photovoltaic solar energy converter will be more eective at elevated temperatures,

0038-092X/$ - see front matter 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.solener.2004.05.016

244

D. Meneses-Rodr guez et al. / Solar Energy 78 (2005) 243250

up to temperatures around 200 C. To our knowledge, this point is still unexplored, although the possibility of the use of converter of the reversed type (LED) at high temperatures was already brought to discussion (Solar Thermophotonic Converters, Tob and Luque, 2002). as A PV solar cell operated at high temperature could be coupled with a heat engine which hot side temperature is determined by the PV cell, making a two-stage hybrid conversion system. The Carnot cycle with the heater at 200 C and cooler at 30 C will have the eciency of 36%. Therefore, if a solar cell at 200 C would convert to electricity 1015% of solar energy, and the heat engine as a second stage of this hybrid system produce another 2025%, the total system eciency could be 3040%. The detailed study of the hybrid system mentioned will be the subject of another paper. Here we present the results of both theoretical and experimental investigation of the temperature dependence in the range mentioned of parameters of the basic PV solar cells with pn junction and the Schottky barrier, taking account of dierent recombination mechanisms and dierent illumination conditions. Some recommendations are given in relation to applications of solar cells in hybrid multistage systems which could provide suciently high overall eciency of the use of solar energy, being at the same time relatively inexpensive.

! 1 Bp Ap ; Lp ! 1 n aDL DL=Ln DL=Ln Bn e An e Jn eDn aC0 e Ln

p Jp eDp aC0

with diusion coecients and lengths Dn , Dp , Ln , Lp , surface recombination rates sn , sp , semiconductor absorption coecient a and incident light ux intensity U0 . Parameters An;p and Bn;p are the coecients depending on aforementioned values obtained as a solution of linear equation set appearing from application of the following boundary conditions taking place over the cell surfaces and SCR boundaries:    dp  sn  sp p0 pn0 ; dn  nDL np0 ;  Dn dx x0 Dp dx xDL 3 pWE wn pn0 expeU=kB T ; nWE wp np0 expeU =kB T : Total generation current was calculated analytically (Serdyuk, 1994) and recombination current value was obtained numerically using coordinate concentration proles under the cumulative inuence of direct recombination, HallShockleyRead (HSR) single-level trap-assisted recombination (with concentration of traps Nr localized at the energy level Er ) (Shockley and Read, 1952) and Auger recombination. The authors have investigated the behavior of currentvoltage curves (CVC) of the model under dierent illumination intensity and temperature to dene the ranges of acceptable eciency values. The model cell parameters included device length DL 0:03 cm with emitter WE 104 cm thick, cell area A 1 cm2 , donor and acceptor concentrations ND NA 1017 cm3 and surface recombination rates sn;p 103 cm/s. Semiconductor parameters used for the model were those of crystalline silicon. The inuence of the temperature on the cell parameters is shown in the Fig. 1. As one can see, eciency decreases due to diminishing of open circuit voltage Uoc and ll factor FF. Small increase of the short-circuit current, was caused by diminishing of HSR recombination rate with temperature due to decrease of eective traps cross-section with temperature. Being observable only for considerable values of traps concentration (within the fractions of percent of main alloying impurity concentrations), it was set to Nr 3 1014 cm3 for calculations to reveal better the phenomenon described. At this concentration, the recombination eect on the charge carriers concentration proles is relatively small and the inuence of the concentrations variation upon the current value could be neglected, so we consider the results obtained as a reasonable approximation. At normal conditions (no light concentration, T 300 K), the eciency of the cell is g 18:4%, which

2. Theoretical investigation To estimate solar cell behavior under concentrated sunlight and elevated temperatures the authors considered one-dimensional theoretical models of pn junction and Schottky barrier valid for ideal diode approximation (Fahrenbruch and Bube, 1983). Model cell with pn junction was characterized by acceptor and donor concentrations NA and ND , band gap Eg as well as thickness of emitter and base layers WE and WB , summing up to overall device thickness DL. Potential barrier height was equal to eUd , and the width of depletion layers forming space charge region (SCR) were wn and wp for the corresponding junction parts, respectively. Electric eld distribution along the x-axis was found by solving Poisson equation. Numerical calculations were performed for the given model for the case of AM1.5 illumination (Hulstorm et al., 1985) from the side of emitter. Overall device current was obtained from continuity equations: dnx ; dx dpx ; Jp epxlp Ex eDp dx Jn enxln Ex eDn

under minority carriers diusion approximation, allowing the general solution in the form:

D. Meneses-Rodr guez et al. / Solar Energy 78 (2005) 243250

245

50 T =300 T =400 Current [mA]

Current [A] 4

S =1

S =10

S=100

T =500

25

0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.5 Voltage [V] 1.0

0 0.0
(a)

(a)

0.5 Voltage [V]

Isc Uoc FF 40

1.0

Isc
1.0

Uoc

FF

80

1.0

Voc [V], FF,

Voc [V], FF,

0.5

0.5

20

Isc [mA]

40

0.0

0.0 300
(b)

400 T [K]

0 500

(b)

1 10 100 Light concentration lg(S) [d.u.]

Fig. 1. Dependence of currentvoltage curves (a) and parameters of solar cell with pn junction modelled (b) upon the temperature.

Fig. 2. Dependence of currentvoltage curves (a) and parameters of solar cell (b) with pn junction on changes of the incident light intensity S.

diminishes to 4.4% for T 500 K. If one wants to get eciency over 10%, it could be achieved for the temperatures less than 410 K. The dependence of the cell parameters on incident light ux concentration S at T 300 K is given in Fig. 2. One can notice rapid shortcircuit current increase with S while open-circuit voltage increases slowly under the same conditions. The eciency g features almost linear increase; it reaches the value of 22.3% for 100-times concentrated sunlight, while the modest concentration S 10 already gives 20.3% eciency yield. To see clearly simultaneous inuence of both temperature and solar concentration, the graph of g was plotted in T versus lgS coordinates (Fig. 3) as contours of constant eciency. For the given axis choice the contour lines have almost linear character. With increase of the temperature the increment of eciency gained for S 100 also increases, but due to quick decrease of the eciency under one sun with growth of T the maximum

Fig. 3. Eciency of solar cell with pn junction in dependence on temperature T and solar concentration degree S.

eciency for T 500 K and S 100 suns reaches only 10.2%. To gain an advantage over the normal conditions

Isc [mA]

246

D. Meneses-Rodr guez et al. / Solar Energy 78 (2005) 243250

Current [mA]

(S 1, T 300 K) one has to select the proper combination of solar concentration and temperature to obtain eciency level higher (to the left) from the contour line corresponding to 18.4% (Fig. 3). This denes the limit temperature of approximately 350 K under concentration of 100 suns. Schottky barrier model was also considered within the frames of ideal diode approximation (Kilchitska and Strikha, 1986). The eciency of the cells with metalsemiconductor (MS) junction depends mainly on the height of potential barrier /b formed between the parts of the device, limited from above with /b Eg . In our calculations, we have considered n-type semiconductor with parameters of crystalline silicon with a golden lm as transparent window contact covering its frontal surface. To account for the interface phenomena in better details, the potential barrier lowering D/ due to electrical imaging processes was considered. The model cell was exposed to a light ux with standard AM1.5 spectrum. Current transport through MS interface was considered to t thermal emission approximation for the case of crystalline silicon characterized with comparatively high carrier mobility values. Total device current was determined from the continuity equations under minority carrier drift current transport approximation as Z DL Z DL J Jp DL JTE e gxdx e rxdx 4 with corresponding currents of carriers diusion, thermal emission together with generation and recombination ones. First terms of (4) could be written as
p Jp DL eDp aC0 eaDL

bination mechanisms as it was done for pn junction cell. Device parameters were optimized to gain the eciency g as high as possible, resulting into device length DL 2 102 cm and alloying level ND 8 1017 cm3 with the presence of residual single-level golden impurity traps having concentration of Nr 1014 cm3 . To be able to make a comparison with pn junction cell model we use the same device thickness and impurity concentrations, yielding eciency g 18:2%. Fig. 4 shows calculated CVC dependencies on the temperature. The eciency values under normal operation conditions are only slightly lower than those of pn junction and the dierence observed is mainly because the lower Uoc and FF gained. The model features decrease of eciency down to 5.8% with increase of the temperature up to 500 K. Joint inuence of the temperature and solar concentration calculated for Schottky barrier cell is shown in Fig. 5 in T versus lgS coordinate grid. The contour lines of g have almost linear behavior, very similar to that shown for pn junction in the Fig. 3. Having the

50 T=300 T=400 T=500 25

! Ap eDL=Lp ;

1 DL=Lp Bp e Lp 5
(a)

0 0.0

0.5 Voltage [V]

Isc Uoc FF

1.0

p here C0 aU0 L2 =Dp 1 a2 L2 ; Ap and Bp are the coefp p cients appearing from the boundary conditions  dp  sp  pDL pn0 ; dx xDL Dp

40

1.0

Thermal emission current has a form JET A T 2 e n

/b D/ kB T

0.5

20

ekB T 1;

eU

with eective Richardson constant A ; total generation n currentthe third item in formula (4)is given by Z DL Z DL e gxdx eaU0 eax dx eU0 1 eaDL : 8
0 0

0.0 300

(b)

400 T [K]

0 500

Recombination current was found from the calculated concentration proles applying the same recom-

Fig. 4. Dependence of currentvoltage curves (a) and parameters of solar cell (b) modelled with metalsemiconductor contact (Schottky barrier) upon the temperature.

Isc [mA]

pwn pn0 expeU =kB T :

Voc [V], FF,

D. Meneses-Rodr guez et al. / Solar Energy 78 (2005) 243250

247

Fig. 5. Eciency of solar cell with MS junction as function of temperature and solar light concentration.

Fig. 6. Photo of the solar concentrator made, with a mono-Si solar cell in the focal plane.

same qualitative dependence, Schottky barrier features slightly better quantitative characteristics, i.e., cell performance at the elevated temperatureshundred-times concentrated sunlight under temperature T 500 K results in g 11:6% versus eciency of 10.2% gained by pn junction under the same illumination and temperature conditions. It follows from our theoretical consideration that the initial (room temperature) eciency of both devices is practically the same; Schottky diodes are less sensitive to the deep level impurities than the pn junction diode and have a smaller temperature dependence of the eciency at equal conditions; the concentration of radiation leads to the decrease of the temperature dependence of cells eciency.

3. Experimental results and discussion 3.1. Experimental set-up For our experiments the closed isothermal box was used with the temperature controlled by Watlows Series 982 1/8 DIN microprocessor-based, ramping controller programmed to maintain a certain temperature within the interval 25200 C. The heaters used in the temperature control system were resistors and the infrared lamps; the heating eect of the light source was also included into the thermal control system. Our experiments with dierent sun simulators as a light source were made in temperature interval 25100 C; those with concentrated solar radiationin the interval 60170 C. As a light source we used the LH153 Solar Simulator with Xenon lamp and dichroic mirror having illumination spectrum reasonably close to Solar AM1.5 spectrum, the illumination intensity of 844 W/m2 . In some

experiments the home-made light source was used based on the halogen lamps, with the spectrum adjusted by lters to have a close resemblance of the sun spectrum, and with the intensity equivalent to AM1 standard (i.e. 925 W/m2 ). In all cases the illumination intensity was controlled by the Digital Illuminance Meter TES 1330. Besides, the mosaical mirror concentrator with automatic solar tracking system was built (the radiation concentration degree S around 30) and used in experiments with concentrated sun light (Fig. 6). We realize that three dierent light sources used could lead to some dierence in the temperature coecients estimated (Nann and Emery, 1992), but at this stage of investigation it was not very important to us. To obtain the parameters of the cells at dierent temperatures, we used the AGILENT 4155 C Semiconductor Parameters Analyzer plotting the total currentvoltage characteristic of illuminated cell. From the latter we found the open-circuit voltage Voc , short-circuit current Isc , the maximum power produced Pmax and the corresponding values of voltage Vm and current Im as well as the ll factor FF; knowing the illumination intensity, the energy conversion eciency g of a cell was found. 3.2. The solar cells studied Mono-Si solar cells with the pn junction are most widely used; our experiments were performed on conventional cells of this type made in Canada, Russia and Ukraine, and the results were practically the same. The typical cell (OKB Krasnoe Znamya, Russia; included in photo, Fig. 6) has dimensions of 85 85 mm2 , 1 W maximum generated power at room temperature and the eciency around 14%. Besides, we studied the experimental cells of approximately the same room temperature eciency having the Schottky barrier made

248

D. Meneses-Rodr guez et al. / Solar Energy 78 (2005) 243250

Table 1 Comparison of the Pmax temperature dependences in parts per thousand and Kelvin KT dPmax =dT =Pmax determined in our experiments and taken from the literature (Nann and Emery, 1992) Cell Mono-Si, Schottky diode, non-concentrated light (AM1.0) Mono-Si, pn, non-concentrated light (AM1.5) Mono-Si, pn, concentrated sun light (S 30) Amorphous Si CuInSe2 Literature values of KT )5.4 to )3.4 )5.4 to )3.4 )2.2 )5.9 to )2.4 Our experiment )4.2 )5.9 )5.4 )2.1 )2.5 Our theoretical estimations )3.5 )3.9 )3.0

at low-temperature technological cycle in Ukraine (Chernivtsi National University), with the n-type Si wafer as a base doped with P at the rear-contact region to make the n layer at the back, the ITO front barrier contact (obtained by spraying with further pyrolysis of InCl3 and SnCl4 alcohol solutions on Si surface) and the SiOx insulating layer transparent for electron tunneling between the base and the barrier layer. These two types of cell we consider as basic ones, and the results of our theoretical studies are applicable to them at full extent. For comparison, we studied two other types of cell. The rst is the 3-junction amorphous Si cell a-Si:H: a-SiGe:H: a-SiGe:H with 1 W maximum generated power made by Energy Conversion Devices (ECD), Troy, Michigan, the otherCuInSe2 thin lm 10 W solar module ST-10 of Siemens Solar Industries, Camarillo, California (both USA). These cells were studied only within temperature interval 2580 C, because at higher temperatures they display the irreversible changes of parameters; thus, the temperature coecients of maximum power generated presented in Table 1 refer to this interval. These cells are not described by our theoretical model, but both theoretical and experimental data related to them exist in the literature (Nann and Emery, 1992; Virshup et al., 1990; Friedman, 1996). 3.3. The temperature variation of parameters of the solar cells The main results obtained are summarized in Table 1 and illustrated by the Figs. 7 and 8. The table presents the temperature coecients of the maximum power generated KT dPmax =dT =Pmax found in the literature, measured in our experiments and calculated from our theoretical considerations. For the latter, we used the data presented in Fig. 3 for the pn junction and Fig. 5 for the Schottky diode, assuming that the ratio dPmax =Pmax is equal to dg=g, and taking the data for the eciency g from the gures. One can see that our calculated data fall within the interval of the coecient values found in the literature. Experimental values are larger than calculated ones which is reasonable taking into account that the model is idealized; the temperature

0.6 Voc(V), FF, FF

80

0.4

Isc(mA)

Voc 0.2 I sc 0.0 20 70 Temperature (oC)

40

0 120

Fig. 7. Dependence of characteristics of solar cell with Schottky barrier on the temperature under non-concentrated irradiation.

1.0

Voc [V], Isc [A/cm2], P [W]

Isc
0.8

Uoc

0.6

0.4

0.2 60 80 100 120 140 160 180

Temperature [C]
Fig. 8. Experimental (hollow symbols) and theoretical (solid symbols) data obtained with concentrated irradiation of c-Si pn junction solar cell: open-circuit voltage (circles), short-circuit current (squares), power generated (triangles).

coecient for the Schottky diode is lower than for pn junction, and the latter decreases with the use of concentrated sun light, which also agrees with the theory. The coecients found for amorphous Si and CuInSe2 (CIS) cells are much lower than both theoretical and experimental values for mono-Si cells, which does not contradict to the literature (we must note that the interval of coecients values for CIS cells given in the literature is very large; the value we obtained is close to

D. Meneses-Rodr guez et al. / Solar Energy 78 (2005) 243250

249

the lowest of the values reported, see Bottenberg and Reinker, 1988). Fig. 7 gives the experimental temperature dependence of the main parameters of the Schottky cell. It could be seen from the gure that the temperature variation of all the parameters (the short-circuit current, open-circuit voltage, ll factor and eciency) qualitatively corresponds to that predicted by theory (Fig. 4b), although our theoretical consideration gives the smaller temperature dependence of the eciency. The data presented are typical for all cells of this type. The data characterizing the performance of mono-Si cell with pn junction at dierent temperatures under the concentrated solar radiation are presented in Fig. 8. The same gure also shows the theoretical data calculated for the conditions of experiment. One can see that calculations give the right order of magnitude for all parameters, the experimental values are lower because of the idealized assumptions taken at calculations. In comparison with behavior of the same cell at non-concentrated radiation, here we have the smaller temperature dependence of open-circuit voltage, in agreement with the theoretical calculations, and quite the opposite dependence of the short-circuit current (it steadily decreases with an increase of temperature, whereas without concentration it slightly increases); the theory does not predict the current decrease. We could explain the observed behavior of the current by the eect of a parasite series resistance: at concentrated radiation and high temperature, the internal cell resistance greatly decreases, and the external series resistance eect becomes more noticeable. Still, these results show that even this cell (the least promising for the high temperature work) could be operated at temperatures as high as 100170 C, thus showing the possibility of creation of the two-stage hybrid systems mentioned above. One can expect that the a-Si, CIS or GaAs cells will be even more appropriate for that purpose. To nd the optimal cells and conditions for this operation, more experimental work is needed. Most probably, the cell optimal for high temperature performance ought to have the larger band gap (in our model, the band gap value aects the generation current, and through it the other parameters) and a special construction providing long enough lifetime at working conditions.

it could be said that the high-temperature cells had yet to be designed, constructed and investigated (starting from a proper choice of the basic material), but even the data already obtained with the existing cells are promising. It encourages to continue investigations in this direction, with the nal goal to create a two-stage hybrid solar system using the concentrator of solar radiation maintaining the cell temperature around 150 C, with the benets of the corresponding increase of its eciency (say, from 1012% to 1416%), having the second stage as thermoelectric generator or a heat engine (Stirling engine, for example); the latter with the sink temperature of around 30 C could provide an eciency of heat-tomechanical energy conversion of the order of 2025% (for this last estimation we used the Carnot expression; it is known that the eciency of Stirling engine is close to that of ideal one). Since the mechanical energy could be converted to electrical one with an eciency better than 90%, it means that the total eciency of solar-to-electric energy conversion of the hybrid system may be well above 30%, without the employment of expensive materials and technology. Besides, these new cells would be ideal for applications where high temperature is inevitable.

Acknowledgements The authors would like to acknowledge the support of CONACYT of Mexico, through the project 33901-U.

References
Bottenberg, W.R., Reinker, D., 1988. Outdoor performance of hybrid, four-terminal tandem photovoltaic modules based on thin lm silicon: hydrogen and copper indium diselenide. In: Proceedings of 20th IEEE PVSC, 1230. Fahrenbruch, A., Bube, R., 1983. Fundamentals of Solar cells. Academic Press, New York. Friedman, D.J., 1996. Modelling of tandem cell temperature coecients. In: Proceedings of 25th IEEE PVSC, 89. Green, M.A., Emery, K., Blakers, A.W., 1982. Silicon solar cells with reduced temperature sensitivity. Electron. Lett. 18, 97. Hulstorm, R., Bird, R., Riodan, C., 1985. Spectral solar irradiance data sets for selected terrestrial conditions. Sol. Cells 15, 365. Kilchitska, S.S., Strikha, V.I., 1986. Properties of Solar Cells with Schottky Barriers. Optoelectr. i Poluprov. Tekhn. 1, 3 11. Nann, S., Emery, K., 1992. Sol. Energy Mater. Sol. Cells 27, 189. Osterwald, C.R., Glatfelter, T., Burdick, J., 1987. Comparison of the temperature coecients of the basic IV parameters for various types of solar cells. In: Proceedings of 19th IEEE PVSC, 188. Serdyuk, V.V., 1994. Physics of solar elements. Logos, Odessa.

4. Conclusions Our main conclusion from both theoretical and experimental study is that certain types of solar cells can operate at relatively high temperatures (100170 C) without drastic loss at their eciency. The lifetime of these cells at the conditions mentioned was not studied;

250

D. Meneses-Rodr guez et al. / Solar Energy 78 (2005) 243250 Torchynska, T.V., 1998. Current state of space and terrestrial solar energetics. Opto-Electron. Rev. 6 (2), 121138. Virshup, G.F., Chung, B.C., Ladle Ristow, M., Kurila, M.S., Brinker, D., 1990. Temperature coecients of multijunction solar cells. In: Proceedings of 21 IEEE PVSC, 336. Wysocki, J.J., Rappaport, P., 1960. Eect of temperature on photovoltaic solar energy conversion. J. Appl. Phys. 31, 571577.

Shockley, W., Read, W.T., 1952. Statistics of the recombination of holes and electrons. Phys. Rev. 87, 835. Sze, S.M., 1981. Physics of Semiconductor Devices, second ed. John Wiley and Sons, New York. pp. 79807. Tob I., Luque, A., 2002. Ideal eciency and potential of as, solar thermophotonic converters under optically and thermally concentrated power ux. IEEE Trans. Electron. Dev. 49, 2024.