Structural and Transport Properties of Hot Wall Deposited CuInSe₂ Thin Films and the Fabrication of CuInSe₂ Based Solar Cells

Films of CuInSe₂ were deposited onto glass substrates by a hot wall deposition method under thermodynamic equilibrium condition using bulk CuInSe₂ as a source material. All the deposited CuInSe₂ films were found to be polycrystalline in nature exhibiting the chalcopyrite structure with the crystallite orientation along (101), (112), (103), (211), (220), (312) and (400) directions. The crystallites were found to have a preferred orientation along the (112) direction. Microstructural parameters of the films, such as grain size, dislocation density, tetragonal distortion and strain have been determined. The grain sizes in the films have been found in the range of 89 to 244 nm. Hall effect studies have been carried out on the hot wall deposited CuInSe₂ thin films. Hall voltage has been measured as a function of temperature in the range 80 to 460 K. The obtained positive Hall voltage indicates that the prepared CuInSe₂ films are of p‐type nature with holes as majority charge carriers. The Hall co‐efficient is found to decrease with increase in film thickness. The carrier concentration in CuInSe₂ films is found to be of the order of 10¹⁷ cm⁻³. The carrier concentration is observed to increase with increase in film thickness. The Hall mobility is found to increase very slowly in the low temperature region from 80 to about 215 K, and then rapidly with increase in temperature above 215 K. The mobility is found to increase with increase in film thickness. The dependence of T^3/2 law for Hall mobility indicates that scattering on ionized impurities is predominant in the temperature region above 215 K in hot wall deposited CuInSe₂ thin films. The grain boundary potential (E_b) of CuInSe₂ thin films of different thickenesses has been evaluated. The barrier height is observed to decrease with increase in carrier concentration indicating the presence of partially depleted grains in CuInSe₂ films. CuInSe₂‐based solar cells with CdS as buffer layer were fabricated. The fabricated solar cells were illuminated using 100 mW/cm² white light under AM1 conditions. The current and voltage were measured using an optical power meter and an electrometer, respectively. The solar cell parameters, open circuit voltage (V_oc), short circuit current (I_sc), series resistance (R_s), shunt resistance (R_sh), power maximum (P_max) and fill factor (FF) were determined.

Keywords:

• CuInSe₂ thin films
• Hall effect
• hot wall deposition
• solar cell
• structure

One of the authors (S.A.) expresses his gratitude to Tamil Nadu State Council for Science and Technology‐Chennai for the award of “Young Scientist Fellowship”. The Management and Principal of Coimbatore Institute of Technology are gratefully acknowledged for their academic and financial support.