2区-SHORT+COMMUNICATION+Laser+isolation+of+shunted+regions+in+industrial+solar+cells.pdfVIP

PROGRESS IN PHOTOVOLTAICS: RESEARCH AND APPLICATIONS Prog. Photovolt: Res. Appl. 2007; 15:613–620 Published online 8 May 2007 in Wiley InterScience DOI: 10.1002/pip.766 Research SHORT COMMUNICATION Laser Isolation of Shunted Regions in Industrial Solar Cells 1*,y 1 2 3 3 M. D. Abbott , T. Trupke , H. P. Hartmann , R. Gupta and O. Breitenstein 1The University of New South Wales, Centre of Excellence for Advanced Silicon Photovoltaics and Photonics, Sydney, Australia 2Deutsche Cell GmbH, Berthelsdorfer Strasse 111A, 09599 Freiberg, Germany 3Max Planck Institute of Microstructure Physics, Halle, Germany This paper provides proof of concept for a technique that uses laser-ablated grooves to locally isolate shunted regions in industrial silicon solar cells. The shunted regions are located using photoluminescence imaging and then isolated from the active cell area with a Nd:YAG laser. By applying this shunt isolation technique, we demonstrate that a strongly shunted 9 6% ef?cient industrial screen-printed solar cell could be recovered to 13 3%. With further development this technique could be applied in an industrial environment to mitigate yield losses and improve average cell ef?ciencies. Copyright # 2007 John Wiley Sons, Ltd. key words: laser processing; shunt; photoluminescence; lock-in thermography Received 31 January 2007; Revised 21 March 2007 INTRODUCTION f?ciency loss due to regions of low shunt resistance is one of the major challenges currently facing PV manufacturers. Shunted cells signi?cantly reduce average ef?ciencies, result in modules with poor low Elight performance and reduce the total yield. This problem is particularly pronounced in cells fabricated on cheaper forms of silicon where material induced defects present many different sources of shunting1 and is therefore expected to become worse in the future given the current shortage in silicon feedstock. In many cases, the source of low shunt resistance is highly localized, one example is c