Effects of Cd-free buffer layer for CuInSe/sub 2/ thin-film solar cells

Abstract

A ZnO buffer layer by a chemical-bath deposition (CBD) method is developed in this study to improve the interface quality between the n-ZnO window layer and p-CuInSe/sub 2/ (CIS) thin-film absorber in CIS thin-film solar cells as one of the approaches to the fabrication of Cd-free thin-film solar cells. The optimization of the fabrication conditions of CBD-ZnO leads to an efficiency of about 10%. These results indicate that the CBD-ZnO buffer layer has a rather high capability to fabricate high-efficiency CIS thin-film solar cells.