TY - JOUR
T1 - Impact of acetic acid exposure on metal contact degradation of different crystalline silicon solar cell technologies
AU - Iqbal, Nafis
AU - Li, Mengjie
AU - Sakthivel, Tamil S.
AU - Mikeska, Kurt
AU - Lu, Meijun
AU - Nandakumar, Naomi
AU - Duttagupta, Shubham
AU - Dhamrin, Marwan
AU - Tsuji, Kosuke
AU - Bowden, Stuart
AU - Augusto, André
AU - Guan, Yuejun
AU - Seal, Sudipta
AU - Davis, Kristopher O.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2023/1/15
Y1 - 2023/1/15
N2 - Degradation due to acetic acid in photovoltaic (PV) modules has been a commonly observed phenomenon for both damp-heat exposure and outdoor operations. Acetic acid is a degradation byproduct of ethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA), a common module encapsulant. To address this issue, robust metallization pastes and cell technologies are being developed. However, it is important to assess how these technologies perform in an acetic acid environment and withstand degradation before they are implemented in the solar market. In this work, we investigate the impact of acetic acid exposure on four different cell groups: monofacial passivated emitter and rear contact (PERC) cells with advanced telluride-based front contact pastes, bifacial PERC cells with novel aluminum rear contact pastes, bifacial tunnel oxide passivated contacts (TOPCon) cells, and silicon heterojunction (SHJ) cells. These cells were exposed to acetic acid for different time increments. The recombination losses were characterized by Suns-VOC, and multi-variate regression analysis of intensity-dependent photoluminescence (PL) images with Griddler AI. Resistive losses were tracked with the transmission line method (TLM). Samples showing severe performance degradation were selected for further materials characterization to understand the root cause. Top-down and cross-sectional scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS), and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) were performed to investigate the change in materials properties. Our study shows that the front contacts of the bifacial TOPCon cells and monofacial PERC cells were significantly affected by acetic acid exposure. The SHJ cells were found to be the most stable.
AB - Degradation due to acetic acid in photovoltaic (PV) modules has been a commonly observed phenomenon for both damp-heat exposure and outdoor operations. Acetic acid is a degradation byproduct of ethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA), a common module encapsulant. To address this issue, robust metallization pastes and cell technologies are being developed. However, it is important to assess how these technologies perform in an acetic acid environment and withstand degradation before they are implemented in the solar market. In this work, we investigate the impact of acetic acid exposure on four different cell groups: monofacial passivated emitter and rear contact (PERC) cells with advanced telluride-based front contact pastes, bifacial PERC cells with novel aluminum rear contact pastes, bifacial tunnel oxide passivated contacts (TOPCon) cells, and silicon heterojunction (SHJ) cells. These cells were exposed to acetic acid for different time increments. The recombination losses were characterized by Suns-VOC, and multi-variate regression analysis of intensity-dependent photoluminescence (PL) images with Griddler AI. Resistive losses were tracked with the transmission line method (TLM). Samples showing severe performance degradation were selected for further materials characterization to understand the root cause. Top-down and cross-sectional scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS), and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) were performed to investigate the change in materials properties. Our study shows that the front contacts of the bifacial TOPCon cells and monofacial PERC cells were significantly affected by acetic acid exposure. The SHJ cells were found to be the most stable.
KW - Acetic acid
KW - Contact degradation
KW - Corrosion
KW - Crystalline silicon solar cells
KW - Metallization paste
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U2 - 10.1016/j.solmat.2022.112089
DO - 10.1016/j.solmat.2022.112089
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85141921786
SN - 0927-0248
VL - 250
JO - Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells
JF - Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells
M1 - 112089
ER -