Study of the influence of the base thickness on photoelectric parameters of silicon solar cells with the new TCAD algorithms

The Sentaurus TCAD software package is widely used in the modeling of semiconductor optoelectronic devices. The main part of simulating solar elements is creating a correct geometric model. A geometric model can be built using the SDE module in two different ways, i.e. by writing code or using standard shapes in a graphical environment. Creating complex structures using simple shapes is time-consuming and labour intensive. Therefore, this paper provides data on how to develop algorithms using geometric models of complex structural solar cells. A universal algorithm has been developed for creating a geometric model of solar cells with a sinusoidal p-n junction and a rear multiple structure. Using these algorithms, it is possible to create geometric models of various solar cells from simple to complex structures. By applying this algorithm, the authors studied the dependence of photoelectric parameters of the p-n and n-p junction silicon solar cells on their thickness in order to find the optimum thickness for both structures. It has been found, that the optimum thickness was equal to 256 μm for p-n junction and 75 μm for n-p junction silicon solar cell. The maximum efficiency of p-n junction silicon solar cell is 1.4 times greater than that of n-p junction solar cell in their optimum thickness.