Defect Engineering in Earth-Abundant Cu<sub>2</sub>ZnSnSe<sub>4</sub> Absorber Using Efficient Alkali Doping for Flexible and Tandem Solar Cell Applications

Muhammad Rehan; Ara Cho; Inyoung Jeong; Kihwan Kim; Asmat Ullah; Jun-Sik Cho; Joo Hyung Park; Yunae Jo; Sung Jun Hong; Seung Kyu Ahn; SeJin Ahn; Jae Ho Yun; Jihye Gwak; Donghyeop Shin

doi:10.1002/eem2.12604

Energy & Environmental Materials ›› 2024, Vol. 7 ›› Issue (2) : 12604-8. DOI: 10.1002/eem2.12604

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Defect Engineering in Earth-Abundant Cu₂ZnSnSe₄ Absorber Using Efficient Alkali Doping for Flexible and Tandem Solar Cell Applications

Muhammad Rehan¹^,² ,
Ara Cho¹^,² ,
Inyoung Jeong¹ ,
Kihwan Kim¹^,² ,
Asmat Ullah¹^,² ,
Jun-Sik Cho¹ ,
Joo Hyung Park¹^,² ,
Yunae Jo¹ ,
Sung Jun Hong¹^,² ,
Seung Kyu Ahn¹ ,
SeJin Ahn¹^,² ,
Jae Ho Yun³ ,
Jihye Gwak¹^,² ,
Donghyeop Shin¹^,²

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Abstract

To demonstrate flexible and tandem device applications, a low-temperature Cu₂ZnSnSe₄ (CZTSe) deposition process, combined with efficient alkali doping, was developed. First, high-quality CZTSe films were grown at 480 ℃ by a single co-evaporation, which is applicable to polyimide (PI) substrate. Because of the alkali-free substrate, Na and K alkali doping were systematically studied and optimized to precisely control the alkali distribution in CZTSe. The bulk defect density was significantly reduced by suppression of deep acceptor states after the (NaF + KF) PDTs. Through the low-temperature deposition with (NaF + KF) PDTs, the CZTSe device on glass yields the best efficiency of 8.1% with an improved V_OC deficit of 646 mV. The developed deposition technologies have been applied to PI. For the first time, we report the highest efficiency of 6.92% for flexible CZTSe solar cells on PI. Additionally, CZTSe devices were utilized as bottom cells to fabricate four-terminal CZTSe/perovskite tandem cells because of a low bandgap of CZTSe (~1.0 eV) so that the tandem cell yielded an efficiency of 20%. The obtained results show that CZTSe solar cells prepared by a low-temperature process with in-situ alkali doping can be utilized for flexible thin-film solar cells as well as tandem device applications.

Keywords

alkali doping / Earth-abundant Cu₂ZnSnSe₄ / flexible solar cells / four-terminal tandem cells / low-temperature process

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Muhammad Rehan, Ara Cho, Inyoung Jeong, Kihwan Kim, Asmat Ullah, Jun-Sik Cho, Joo Hyung Park, Yunae Jo, Sung Jun Hong, Seung Kyu Ahn, SeJin Ahn, Jae Ho Yun, Jihye Gwak, Donghyeop Shin. Defect Engineering in Earth-Abundant Cu₂ZnSnSe₄ Absorber Using Efficient Alkali Doping for Flexible and Tandem Solar Cell Applications. Energy & Environmental Materials, 2024, 7(2): 12604‒8 https://doi.org/10.1002/eem2.12604

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