Efficient, Stable, and Transparent Photovoltaic Cells with Segment-Patterned Micro-Cavity Cathodes.

Abstract

Transparent photovoltaic cells (TPVs) have garnered growing interest due to their potential applications in diverse daily life activity, ranging from smart windows, car windows to agricultural uses including watch top class.This work presents effective fabrication method for TPVs aimed at addressing the thermal effects encountered during device process. By integrating nanosecond laser processing with spatially segmented PV technology, we achieve TPVs that maintain natural color features without color shifts in the Commission Internationale de l´Eclairage (CIE). Unlike femtosecond lasers, which have a shorter pulse width, and can induce serious thermal effects, nanosecond lasers were chosen despite their longer pulse width to mitigate such thermal issues leading to lower device effciency and shorter lifetime. Additionally, to address process quality concerns, traditional thick silver electrodes were replaced with a micro-cavity cathode composed of 90 nm of MgF2. The fabricated TPVs exhibit promising metrics, including a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 4.51%, average visible transmission (AVT) of 51.86%, and light utilization efficiency (LUE) of 2.34%. Notably, this advancement extends the lifetime of TPVs from 483 hours (with thick Ag cathodes) to 727 hours (T80).These results underscore the potential of our approach to propel TPVs technology closer to industrial-scale production and widespread application.