Nanostructured solar cells

Nanostructured solar cells

Surendra K. Pandey

Photovoltaics presently represent the fastest growing sector of the electricity generation industry, although growing from a small base. Energy conversion efficiency is a key parameter with this technology since it directly impacts both material and deployment costs. The performance of the traditional bulk semiconductor solar cell is limited to about 33% while thermodynamic limits on the conversion of sunlight to electricity are much higher at 93%. Low dimensional structures appear capable of allowing much of this gap to be bridged. Nanostructure based solar energy is attracting significant attention as possible candidate for achieving drastic improvement in photovoltaic energy conversion efficiency. The use of nanostructures in photovoltaics offers the potential for high efficiency by either using new physical mechanisms or by allowing solar cells which have efficiencies closer to their theoretical maximum, for example by tailoring material properties. At the same time, nanostructures have potentially low fabrication costs, moving to structures or materials which can be fabricated using chemically or biologically formed materials. Despite this potential, there are multiple and significant challenges in achieving viable nanostructured solar cells, ranging from the demonstration of the fundamental mechanisms, device-level issues such as transport mechanisms and device structures and materials to implement nanostructured solar cells, and low cost fabrication techniques to implement high performance designs. The cell designs and enhancements are categorized by the type of nanostructure utilized. These include bulk nanostructured materials (3D), quantum wells (2D), nanowires (1D), and quantum dots/nanoparticles (0D). During the last decade, the development of the photovoltaic device theory and nanofabrication technology enables studies of more complex nanostructured solar cells with higher conversion efficiency and lower production cost. The fundamental principles and important features of these advanced solar cell designs are systematically presented and summarized, with a focus on the function and role of nanostructures and the key factors affecting device performance. Among various nanostructures, special attention has been given to those relying on quantum effect.

Keywords
Photovoltaics, Nanostructures, Low-cost Self-assembled Nanostructures, Nanostructured Solar Cell Systems, Solar Power

Published online 8/2/2017, 59 pages

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.21741/9781945291371-3

Part of Recent Advances in Photovoltaics

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