Silicon-on-ceramic for low cost solar cells

Inexpensive ceramic substrates can be coated from the melt with a thin layer of large grain polycrystalline silicon to produce low cost solar cells. The properties are quite similar to those of EFG ribbons. A focussed light beam from a monochromator was used to evaluate cell uniformity and to measure minority carrier diffusion length within grains. Cells with active areas of 1cm2and without AR coatings currently have AM1 conversion efficiencies over 7% and inherent efficiencies over 12%.