We investigate the effect of surface texturing on the light trapping properties of Silicon wafers as a function of reflection reduction and surface morphology. This was achieved by structuring a random square-based pyramids pattern on the surface of Silicon substrate using anisotropy etching. The light trapping effect was optimized for silicon solar cells by investigating the dependence of the silicon surface texturing on the process parameters such as etchant concentration, etching time and temperature. We study the surface morphology by analyzing the surface behaviour of the textured substrate using the atomic force microscope and scanning electron microscope. The results of roughness and optical reflection were obtained using the surface profiler and the UV/VIS the spectrometer respectively. In addition, an analytical modelling method was developed to determine the angles of incidence of light rays with each of the facets of the pyramids and the coordinate of the reflected light rays. The method used here is based on 3-D vector geometry of the pyramidal facets. The optimum parameters are found to be 40min, a temperature of 80oC and with KOH/IPA/DI in the ratio [2:4:46] by volume, yielding a surface roughness over 600 nm and a relative optical reflectance in the visible spectrum less than 10%, using polished Si as reference. The results and analysis of both the modelled and measured reflectance, suggest that the performance of the light trapping technique has a big potential in silicon solar cells application.
Study of surface morphology and optical characterization of crystalline and multi-crystalline silicon surface textured in highly diluted alkaline solutions
