Freestanding and supported processing of sub-70 μm kerfless epitaxial Si and thinned Cz/FZ Si foils into solar cells: An overview of recent progress and challenges

Abstract Utilisation of expensive silicon (Si) material in crystalline Si modules has come down to 4 g Si per watt-peak in 2018, mainly as a result of reduction in wafer thickness and kerf losses as well as increase in module efficiencies. With continued progress in conventional multi-wire sawing of ingots, wafers as thin as 100 μm could eventually be produced. Beyond this, kerfless lift-off technologies are being investigated which enable wafer thicknesses well below 100 μm with negligible Si kerf waste. Such thin Si wafers and foils would be much lighter in weight than today's standard 165-180 μm-thick wafers and would exhibit considerable flexibility and fragility. This necessitates a rethink about how to handle and process thin Si into solar devices in a manufacturing line with high mechanical yield and high throughput. This paper gives a broad overview of the different approaches for fabricating solar cells on thin Si foils. In particular, three routes are discussed in detail, namely (1) freestanding processing of thin Si, (2) processing of thin Si supported mechanically on a conductive low-cost Si substrate (“wafer-equivalent” approach) and (3) processing of thin Si bonded to a transparent glass superstrate. In each case, the main challenges are explained and the recent progress in addressing them are summarised. Kerfless 50 μm-thick epitaxial Si foils lifted-off using porous Si and thinned-down Si wafers (below 70 μm) are used as model substrates for this work.