Enhanced performance of ZnO/c-Si solar cell using interface engineering with grooves morphology

Abstract

In this paper, a new approach based on ZnO/Silicon interface engineering aspect is proposed to enhance the absorbance performance for n-ZnO/p-Si hetero-junction based solar cell. The merits of using grooves morphology in the ZnO/Silicon interface to improve the photovoltaic performance are investigated numerically using accurate solutions of Maxwell's equations. It is found that the proposed interface morphology arises the optical confinement effect which can efficiently improve the device optical performance. Besides, the proposed structure exhibits superior photovoltaic performance and offers improved absorbance behavior as compared to the conventional counterpart. Moreover, the introduced grooves in the n-ZnO/p-Si interface play a crucial role in increasing the light absorbance through modulating the electric field behavior inside the absorber region. These characteristics not only underline the enhanced optical behavior of the investigated structure but also bring the possibility of overcoming the tradeoff between the high efficiency and the low fabrication cost. This makes the proposed n-ZnO/p-Si hetero-junction solar cell with interface texturization a potential alternative for developing high-performance solar cell with low manufacturing cost.