Abstract
The aim of this research work was to assess the impact of front and rear grid metallization pattern on the performance of silicon solar cells. We have investigated the effect of front grid metallization design and geometry on the open-circuit voltage (Voc), short circuit current density (Jsc), fill factor (FF) and efficiency (ŋ) of silicon solar cells by using Griddler 2.5 simulation program. We used different number of metal fingers ranging from 80–120 having width of 60 µm and different number of busbars ranging from 1–5 busbars on the front and rear side of solar cells for optimization. We have also calculated the efficiency and fill factor at different values of front contact resistance ranging from (0.1–100) mohm-cm2, front and rare layer sheet resistances ranging from (60–110) ohm/sq and different edge gaps. We found that the maximum efficiency and fill factor was obtained with those parameters, when front and rare contact resistances were taken as same. We have designed an optimized silicon solar cell with 115 number of fingers, 4 busbars, front and rare contact resistance of 0.1 mohm-cm2 and front and rare layer sheet resistance of 60 ohm/sq. In this way we were able to successfully optimize the silicon solar cell having efficiency and fill factor of 19.49 % and 81.36 % respectively, for our best optimized silicon solar cell.
Assessing the impact of front grid metallization pattern on the performance of silicon solar cells
