Ultra-Lean Silver Screen-Printing for Sustainable Terawatt-Scale Photovoltaic

Abstract

As the photovoltaics industry approaches the terawatt (TW) manufacturing scale, the consumption of silver in screen-printed contacts must be significantly reduced for all cell architectures to avoid risks of depleting the global silver supply and substantial cost inflations. With alternative metallization techniques (e.g., plating) facing their own challenges for mass production, advancements in the mainstream screen-printing technology to accelerate the pace of silver reductions are urgently needed. This work presents a silver-lean screen-printed contact scheme, providing scope for substantial reductions in silver consumption based on existing industrial screen-printing capabilities. The initial testing of such a design leads to the fabrication of 24.04% efficient large-area TOPCon solar cells with 9 mg W⁻¹ silver consumption compatible with existing soldering-based interconnection technologies, corresponding to a 25%_rel reduction in silver usage compared to standard industrial screen-printed TOPCon solar cells. Upon further optimization in pattern designs and fabrication processes, this silver-lean design offers a promising pathway toward ultra-low silver consumption of less than 2 mg W⁻¹ for screen-printed TOPCon solar cells without sacrificing efficiency.