Development and progress in thin film Si photovoltaic technologies

Photovoltaic Power Generation Technology Research Association (PVTEC) has organized the consortium of one national research institute and five private companies, which has been supported technically by three universities. It has developed thin film Si PV technologies of improving conversion efficiency and developing a high-productivity Si deposition apparatus. For improving the conversion efficiency, the stabilized efficiency of 10.1% for an a-Si:H cell, 11.0% for a μc-Si cell, and 12.2% with light induced degradation ratio of less than 3% have been achieved, respectively. We have also successfully developed a plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) machine, which can deposit high-quality μc-Si films uniformly on a large-scale substrate with high deposition-rate by using very high frequency (VHF) plasma.