Objective
The minority carrier diffusion lengths are small in polycrystalline or amorphous materials used in thin film solar cells, requiring thin layers to maximize charge collection. This is contradictory for the requirement to maximize solar energy absorption. The optical design consisting in increasing solar cell’s light-trapping capability is of prime importance. In order to provide total internal reflection, both randomly textured surfaces and regularly patterned surfaces have been investigated. No one of these approaches provides optimal light trapping because no one is suitable for the broad solar spectrum.
Recent approaches involving new TCO layers show that double textures provide improved scattering. The AGATHA project aims to realize an advanced light trapping design by combining micro-texturing of glass by hot embossing and nano-texturing of the top TCO layer by etching. The parameters of this “modulated surface texture” can be adjusted to maximize the light scattering in all the solar spectrum to provide a significant increase in both short-circuit current and EQE. Suitable for high production throughput, the new texturation process chain developed in AGATHA fits with the intrinsic low cost nature of thin film solar cells
To demonstrate the efficiency of this optical trapping design, the modulated texture concept will be implemented in a-Si:H based, µ-c-Si:H based and CIGS based thin films technologies. The objective is to reduce the active material thickness, from 250 nm up to 150 nm for the a-Si:H, from 1.5 µm up to 1 µm for µc-Si:H and from 2.5 µm up to 800 nm for the CIGS, when increasing the short circuit current of 15 % The choice of these technologies aims to maximize the impact by addressing 70% of the thin film market. According to typical solar cells cost structure, a 15 % reduction of the cost/m2 is achievable. Combined with the Jsc improvement, the implementation of modulated surface texture should result in a 20 % decrease of the €/W indicator.
AGATHA is an EU coordinated project in the framework of call FP7-ENERGY-2010-INDIA, foreseeing a simultaneous start with the Indian coordinated project. Accordingly, the Indian project should start at the latest within 3 months of the signature of the EU grant agreement.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.
- engineering and technology environmental engineering energy and fuels renewable energy solar energy
- engineering and technology materials engineering coating and films
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Programme(s)
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Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Call for proposal
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Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
FP7-ENERGY-2010-INDIA
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Funding Scheme
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Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Coordinator
75015 PARIS 15
France
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.