Researchers develop new materials for solar cells

Belgian teams from nanoelectronics centre, imec and materials specialist Flamac, are working on the project. Flamac's recently installed physical vapour deposition (PVD) / plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition (PE-CVD) coater allows the automated deposition of a variety of thin film materials. The platform consists of eight process chambers enabling the study of PVD and PE-CVD coating processes. According to Flamac, this coating system combined with its variety of high throughput analytic tools represents a powerful screening platform for accelerated screening of novel materials. imec's research on solar cells focuses on improving the state of the art efficiency and manufacturability of a number of key technologies, most notably silicon based solar cells and thin film solar cells - such as organic solar cells and printed inorganic cells based on nanoparticle inks. imec's thin film solar cell activities are integrated in the Solliance collaboration platform, which has been established to strengthen the region's position as a world player in thin film PV. This, says Solliance, is achievable by joint use of state of the art infrastructure, alignment of research programs and close cooperation with the solar business community. Jef Poortmans, imec's program director, Energy, pictured, said: "We consider the cooperation with Flamac as an essential part in the broadening of PV-portfolio. By combining Flamac's expertise in high throughput material research with our expertise in thin film solar cells, we are convinced that we will achieve interesting results in a shorter frametime."