New high rate deposition tool for hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) thin film solar cells

In the expanding thermal plasma set-up of the Eindhoven University of Technology relatively high deposition rates (10 nm/s) are obtained for the deposition of hydrogenated amorphous silicon. High deposition rate is one of the ways to decrease the costs of the solar cell. The opto-electronic and material properties of the films are very promising [1]. For this reason a-Si:H solar cells will in the future be made in a co-operation between the universities of Delft (DIMES) and Eindhoven (CPS). The set-up that is built to realise this consists of a RF-PECVD part for the doped layers and an expanding thermal cascaded arc plasma to deposit the intrinsic layer at high deposition rates. So far the best intrinsic layers are grown at temperatures of 400 C, thus requiring n- and p-doped layers which are stable at high temperature.