In-situ growth of a CdS window layer by vacuum thermal evaporation for CIGS thin film solar cell applications

Highly crystalline and transparent CdS films are grown by utilizing the vacuum thermal evaporation （VTE） method. The structural, surface morphological, and optical properties of the films are studied and compared with those prepared by chemical bath deposition （CBD）. It is found that the films deposited at a high substrate temperature （200 ℃） have a preferential orientation along （002） which is consistent with CBD-grown films. Absorption spectra reveal that the films are highly transparent and the optical band gap values are found to be in a range of 2.44 eV-2.56 eV. Culnl_xGaxSe2 （CIGS） solar cells with in-situ VTE-grown CdS films exhibit higher values of Voc together with smaller values of Jsc than those from CBD. Eventually the conversion efficiency and fill factor become slightly better than those from the CBD method. Our work suggests that the in-situ thermal evaporation method can be a competitive alternative to the CBD method, particularly in the physical- and vacuum-based CIGS technology.

Effect of concentration of cadmium sulfate solution on structural,optical and electric properties of Cd_(1-x)Zn_(x)S thin films

Cd_(1-x)Zn_(x)S thin films were deposited by chemical bath deposition(CBD)on the glass substrate to study the influence of cadmium sulfate concentration on the structural characteristics of the thin film.The SEM results show that the thin film surfaces under the cadmium sulfate concentration of 0.005 M exhibit better compactness and uniformity.The distribution diagrams of thin film elements illustrate the film growth rate changes on the trend of the increase,decrease,and increase with the increase of cadmium sulfate concentration.XRD studies exhibit the crystal structure of the film is the hexagonal phase,and there are obvious diffraction peaks and better crystallinity when the concentration is 0.005 M.Spectrophotometer test results demonstrate that the relationship between zinc content x and optical band gap value E_(g) can be expressed by the equation E_(g)(x)=0.59x^(2)+0.69x+2.43.Increasing the zinc content can increase the optical band gap,and the absorbance of the thin film can be improved by decreasing the cadmium sulfate concentration,however,all of them have good transmittance.At a concentration of 0.005 M,the thin film has good absorbance in the 300-800 nm range,80%transmittance,and band gap value of 3.24 eV,which is suitable for use as a buffer layer for solar cells.