Transparent Ohmic Contacts for Solution-Processed, Ultrathin CdTe Solar Cells

By Kurley, J. Matthew; Panthani, Matthew G.; Crisp, Ryan W.; Nanayakkara, Sanjini U.; Pach, Gregory F.; Reese, Matthew O.; Hudson, Margaret H.; Dolzhnikov, Dmitriy S.; Tanygin, Vadim; Luther, Joseph M.; Talapin, Dmitri V.
Published in ACS Energy Letters 2017

Abstract

Recently, solution-processing became a viable route for depositing CdTe for use in photovoltaics. Ultrathin (?500 nm) solar cells have been made using colloidal CdTe nanocrystals with efficiencies exceeding 12% power conversion efficiency (PCE) demonstrated by using very simple device stacks. Further progress requires an effective method for extracting charge carriers generated during light harvesting. Here, we explored solution-based methods for creating transparent Ohmic contacts to the solution-deposited CdTe absorber layer and demonstrated molecular and nanocrystal approaches to Ohmic hole-extracting contacts at the ITO/CdTe interface. We used scanning Kelvin probe microscopy to further show how the above approaches improved carrier collection by reducing the potential drop under reverse bias across the ITO/CdTe interface. Other methods, such as spin-coating CdTe/A2CdTe2 (A = Na, K, Cs, N2H5), can be used in conjunction with current/light soaking to improve PCE further.

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