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Effect of the Pb–Te–B–O system glass frits in the front contact paste on the conversion efficiency of crystalline silicon solar cells

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Abstract

In the present paper, many monocrystal silicon (Si) solar cells are produced by screen printing a front contact paste prepared with crystalline silver particles, a series of glass frits with the different lead oxide (PbO) contents in Pb–Te–B–O system glass, and an organic medium. Under scanning electron microscopy, the selective etching of cells screen-printed by pastes containing the glass frits of different PbO contents from low to high (37.2–52.5 mol%) reveals the corrosion degree of antireflection coating and the growth of silver crystallite microstructures on Si substrate. When the PbO content is 42.7 mol% in glass frits, the silver crystallites of optimal size were formed to make the conversion efficiency of cells best. By comparing the cross-section microstructures of solar cells, the different transition temperatures (Tg = 283–546 °C) of glass frits are found to have a substantial impact on wetting behavior during the firing cycle. When the glass Tg is medium (Tg = 393 °C), the optimal glass layer will be obtained to derive photoelectrons smoothly.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by National Hi-Tech Research and Development Program (863) Key Project of China (No. 2012AA050301-SQ2011GX01D01292), China International Science and Technology Cooperation Special Program (No. 2010DFB60400). Major Science and Technology Innovation Subject Fund of Shaanxi Province (No. 2010ZKC03-14) and Xi’an Industrial Technology Innovation Project-technology transfer promoting program (No. CX1242, CXY1123-5, CX12182-3, CX12182-2). The authors thank the State Key Laboratory of Continental Dynamics for the SEM measurements.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Synthetic and Natural Functional Molecule Chemistry (Ministry of Education), College of Chemistry and Materials Science, Northwest University, Xi’an, 710069, People’s Republic of China

    Guojun Zheng, Yuping Tai & Hui Wang

  2. National Key Laboratory of Photoelectric Technology and Functional Materials (Culture Base), National Photoelectric Technology and Functional Materials and Application of International Science and Technology Cooperation Base, Institute of Photonics and Photon-Technology, Northwest University, Xi’an, 710069, People’s Republic of China

    Hui Wang & Jintao Bai

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  1. Guojun Zheng
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  2. Yuping Tai
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  3. Hui Wang
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  4. Jintao Bai
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Correspondence to Hui Wang or Jintao Bai.

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Zheng, G., Tai, Y., Wang, H. et al. Effect of the Pb–Te–B–O system glass frits in the front contact paste on the conversion efficiency of crystalline silicon solar cells. J Mater Sci: Mater Electron 25, 3779–3786 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10854-014-2089-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10854-014-2089-6

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