The next frontier: Electrodeposition for solar cell fabrication

Abstract

Investigations have revealed that electrodeposition has emerged as the most suitable technique for solar cell fabrication. Electrodeposition has been found to provide improved benefits in several solar cell technologies. It is one of the most selective processes, as deposition only occurs at positions on a substrate where the substrate conductivity is the highest. The materials utilization rate in electrodeposition is better than 90% in comparison to evaporation, sputtering, chemical vapor deposition, and some of the wet chemical processes. This is partly due to the selectivity and partly as there is extensive information available on the re-use and recycle of electrodeposition chemistries. It is a low temperature atmospheric process in terms of processing conditions that allows the fabrication of 3D nanometer scale or nanometer planar devices with great precision and control.