Advantages and disadvantages of thin film solar cells

Thin-film solar cells due to the use of less materials, in terms of the cost per module compared to stacked solar cells has significantly reduced, the manufacturing process required energy is also smaller than stacked solar cells, it also has an integrated type of connection module, so that it can save the independent module required in the fixed and internal connection costs.

In the future, thin-film solar cells may replace today's commonly used silicon solar cells and become the mainstream of the market. The main difference between amorphous silicon solar cells and monocrystalline silicon solar cells or polycrystalline silicon solar cells is the difference in materials, monocrystalline silicon solar cells or polycrystalline silicon solar cells are sparse, and the material of amorphous silicon solar cells is SiH4, because of the difference in materials and the structure of amorphous silicon solar cells and crystalline silicon solar cells are slightly different.

The biggest advantage of SiH4 is that the light absorption effect and the light conductivity effect are very good, but its electrical characteristics are similar to insulators, and the semiconductor characteristics of silicon are far from it, so SiH4 was initially considered to be an unsuitable material. But scientists overcame this problem in the 1970s, and soon after, RCA in the United States produced the first amorphous silicon solar cell. Although SiH4 has good light absorption and light conductivity, its crystalline structure is worse than that of polysilicon solar cells, so the problem of suspension bond is more serious than that of polysilicon solar cells, and the rate of free electron and hole recombination is very fast. In addition, the irregular crystalline structure of SiH4 will hinder the movement of electrons and holes, resulting in a short diffusion range.