CHAPTER:1

INTRODUCTION
The name Solar Cell means that it is a cell or a plate which converts solar
energy into the useful electrical energy. The energy which we get from sun is
enormous and it is a great source of energy. Its energy will never finish so this is
also known as as the main source of renewable energy. With the scarcity of nonrenewable energy it is of utmost importance to find a way out to solve the
energy problem by some means within a very short period of time. So there is a
way out which is now developing. That is we are now able to convert the sun
energy to electrical by some means and that is why the importance of solar cell
comes into play. Though it is developing but if it is developed completely, then
every household may produce the energy of its own.The solar cell is a device
which is made of p-n junction diode which effect photo voltaic effect to
convert light energy into electrical energy.

CHAPTER:2

SOLAR ENERGY
Do you know how big sun is? It is around triple three thousands (3,33,000)
times bigger than earth. It is also far away from us. It is around Ninety-three
million miles away from us. The surface and core temperature of the sun as
calculated are 5,600C and 15,000,000C respectively. Nuclear reactions are
continuously going on in the sun. It is a huge mass of constant nuclear activity.
Only sun is the source of all kind of energy available on this planet even it
provides the energy needed to survive all life forms in this planet. Sun controls
the climates and weathers on this planet. It is a huge mass of constant nuclear
activity. Only sun is the source of all kind of energy available on this planet
even it provides the energy needed to survive all life forms in this planet. Sun
controls the climates and weathers on this planet.

Solar Energy:
When sunlight strikes on photovoltaic solar panels solar electricity is produced.
That is why this is also referred to as photovoltaic solar, or PV solar.

Principles of Solar Electricity:

Generation of electricity by using solar energy depends upon the photovoltaic
effect in some specific materials. There are certain materials that produce electric
current when these are exposed to direct sun light. This effect is seen in
combination of two thin layers of semiconductor materials. One layer of this
combination will have a depleted number of electrons. When sunlight strikes on
this layer it absorbs the photons of sunlight ray and consequently the electrons are
excited and jump to the other layer. This unit of such combination of two layers
of semiconductor materials for producing electric potential difference in
2

sunlight is called solar cell. Silicon is normally used as the semiconductor

material for producing such solar cell. For building cell silicon material is cut
into very thin wafers. Some of these wafers are doped with impurities. Then the
un-doped and doped wafers are then sandwiched together to build solar cell.
Metallic strip is then attached to two extreme layers to collect
current.phenomenon creates a charge difference between the layers and resulting to
a tiny potential difference between them. The
Solar energy

Concepts

The Sun - Insolation - Solar radiation - Active and passive solar energy

Thermal mass
Storage

Thermal energy storage

Phase change material
Grid energy storage

Feed-in tarif
Distribution

Adoption

Net metering
Financial incentives for photovoltaics

& uses

Costs

Solar water heating

Solar vehicle
Applications

Electric aircraft
Electric boat
Solar balloon

Other applications

Greenhouse
Agriculture

Polytunnel

and horticulture

Row cover
Solar-powered pump

Building

Passive solar building design

Building-integrated photovoltaics
Urban heat island

Hybrid solar lighting

Solar lamp
Lighting

Solar Tuki
Light tube
Daylighting

Solar pond
Process heat

Solar furnace
Salt evaporation pond

Cooking

Disinfection

Solar cooker

Solar water disinfection

Soil solarization

Desalination

Solar still
Desalination

Solar water heating

Water heating

Solar combisystem
Zero carbon solar controller

CHAPTER:3

SOLAR CELL
The name Solar Cell means that it is a cell or a plate which converts solar
energy into the useful electrical energy. The energy which we get from sun is
enormous and it is a great source of energy. Its energy will never finish so this is
also known as the main source of renewable energy. With the scarcity of nonrenewable energy it is of utmost importance to find a way out to solve the
energy problem by some means within a very short period of time. So there is a
way out which is now developing. That is we are now able to convert the sun
energy to electrical by some means and that is why the importance of solar cell
comes into play. Though it is developing but if it is developed completely, then
every household may produce the energy of its own. The solar cell is a device
which is made of p-n junction diode which effect photo voltaic effect to
convert light energy into electrical energy.

Construction of Solar Cell:

The junction diode is made of SI OR Gates. A thin layer of p-type is grown on
the n-type semiconductor. Top of the p-layer is provided with a few finer
electrodes which leaves open space for the light to reach the thin p-layer and it
under lays p-n junction. Bottom of the n-layer is provided with a current
collecting electrode.
5

Materials Used in Solar Cell:

1.
2.
3.
4.

Silicon.
GaAs.
CdTe.
CuInSe2

Criteria for Materials to be Used in Solar Cell:

1.
2.
3.
4.

Must have band gap from 1ev to 1.8ev.

It must have high optical absorption.
It must have high electrical conductivity.
The raw material must be available in abundance and the cost of the
material must be low.

CHAPTER:4

Solar Cell Manufacturing Technology

There are different types of solar of photovoltaic cells available in the market.
Each of them has its own technical and commercial advantages as well as
disadvantages. The solar cells are mainly categorised on the basis of the
materials used as semiconductor in the cell. Different types of solar cell have
different technical parameters but they can be chosen for use in different
applications depending upon the optimum conditions of the services. The main
row material used to construct a solar cell is semiconductor material and silicon
is widely used semiconductor for that. There is plenty of availability of silicon
on the earth. Silicon is available in normal sand. But extracting pure silicon
from the natural sources is quite expensive. Lots of efforts are required for that
work. In the process silicon is purified, melted, and crystallized. Continuous
researches and developments are going on to reduce the quantity of silicon used
in the solar cell without affecting its performance.
This ensures the availability of cheaper solar cells. Two most common
techniques of producing silicon wafers are the chzrolaski (CZ) and floating zone
(FZ) techniques.Let us discuss some common techniques of solar or
photovoltaic cells.

Thin Film Solar Cell:

This is the cheapest technology available for solar cell.
Most commonly used thin-film solar cell is Amorphous solar cell. Here, a very
thin film of amorphous silicon of few microns thick is used as active layer of
the cell. Reliability and lifespan of these cells are quite poor. The main
advantage of this technology is that it can be manufactured in different shaped
hence can be mounted in any form of surface. Amorphous silicon is basically a
silicon substance but in non crystalline form. It is specially made by deposition
of silicon based gases on subtract. The chemical bonding between atoms in
amorphous silicon is quite similar to that of crystalline silicon but only
difference is that the material electrodes in a vacuum chamber and an RF
voltage is applied between these electrodes, hydrogenised silicon will be
deposited on a warm subtract attached to the electrodes. In this way very thin
film of hydrogenised silicon can be created. The thickness of the film may be
less than 1 micron.
7

The main advantage of amorphous silicon is that, it is quite cheaper than

crystalline silicon. For a given thickness, the light absorption capacity of
amorphous silicon is about 2.5 times more than that of crystalline silicon. As the
quantity of required silicon for producing micro thin film, is quite low
compared to crystalline silicon, the cost as well as the weight of amorphous
silicon solar cell or a-Si:H solar cell is much low. Amorphous silicon is flexible
in nature hence can be easily deposited on flexible and roll way type subtracts.
In addition to Amorphous solar cells there are also Cadmium Telluride (CdTe)
and Copper-Indium-Gallium-Selenide (CIGS) thin film solar cells available in
the market. The materials used for making the active layer of amorphous cells is
amorphous silicon, Cadmium and Tellurium are used for Cadmium Telluride
(CdTe) solar cells and Copper, Indium, Gallium, Selenium are used for CopperIndium-Gallium-Selenide solar cells. The efficiency of amorphous cell is about
6 to 8 % and this low efficiency of amorphous cells is some extend improved in
Cadmium Telluride (CdTe) and Copper-Indium-Gallium-Selenide (CIGS) thin
film solar cells. The efficiency of Cadmium Telluride (CdTe) and CopperIndium-Gallium-Selenide (CIGS) thin film solar cells is about 8 to 11 %. Open
circuit voltage of amorphous cells is 0.7 to 1.1.volt and same for the Cadmium
Telluride (CdTe) and Copper-Indium-Gallium-Selenide (CIGS) thin film solar
cells are 0.8 to 1 volt and 0.5 to 0.7 volts respectively.
has no regular lattice structure. In amorphous silicon a significant number of
silicon atoms create covalent bonds with three neighbour silicon atoms and rest
one valence electron of these silicon atoms creates bond with hydrogen atom.
While a mixture of silicon containing hydrogen gas (SiH4) and raw hydrogen
gas pass through between two

Crystalline Silicon Solar Cell:

Crystalline Silicon Solar Cell has most
advantageous against other available technologies of solar cell manufacturing.
But these cells require purified silicon as row material which is quite expensive.
Here naturally available silicon quartzes are melted, purified and then
crystallized in ingots. Then these ingots then further cut into smaller sized
ingots and then these ingots are sliced into number of thin silicon wafers. These
wafers were generally made 0.3 mm thick in early days but now technology has
developed to make them about 0.15 mm thick. This thickness of the silicon
crystal wafer is important in the view of cost optimization of the cell. Then
these wafers are chemically treated for doping with impurities to create p-n
junction across them.

Then negative and positive metallic contacts are fabricated on top and bottom
the cells by screen printing techniques. The cells typically produce 0.5 to 0.6
volts across them at standard working conditions hence numbers of such cells
are wired in series to produce standard 6 or 12 volts. Numbers of such series
combinations are then arrayed in parallel on a glass substrate or some kind of
insulated reinforced base substrate to increase the power capacity of the module.
Then the module is covered with none conducting transparent encapsulating
resin and then a protective transparent film. The whole module is then framed
with aluminium channel to provide ultimate reinforcement to it. The required
power output is achieved by interconnecting suitable number of such modules
in an array.

CHAPTER:5

PHOTOVOLTAIC EFFECT
The effect due to which light energy is converted to electric energy in certain
semiconductor materials is known as photovoltaic effect. This directly converts
light energy to electricity without any intermediate process. For demonstrating
the photovoltaic effect let us assume a block of silicon crystal. The upper
portion of this block is doped with donor impurities and lower portion is doped
with accept or impurities. Hence the concentration of free electrons is quite high
in n type region compared to p-type region and concentration of hole is quite
high in p-type region compared to n-type region of the block. There will be a
high concentration gradient of charge carriers across the junction line of the
block. Free electrons from n-type region try to diffuse to p-type region and
holes in p-type region try to diffuse to n-type region in the crystal. This is
because charge carriers by nature always tend to diffuse from high
concentration region to low concentration region. Each free electron of n-type
region while comes to the p-type region due to diffusion , it leaves a positive
donor ion behind it in the n-type region.
This is because each of the free electron in n-type region is contributed by one
neutral donor atom. Similarly when a hole is diffused from p-type region to ntype region, it leaves a negative accept or ion behind it in p-type region.

Since each hole is contributed by one acceptor atom in p-type region. Both of these ions
i.e. donor ions and acceptor ions are immobile and fixed at their position in crystal
10

structure. It is needless to say that those free electrons of n-type region which
are nearest to the p-type region first diffuse in the p-type region consequently
create a layer of positive immobile donor ions in the n-type region adjacent to
the junction.

Similarly those free holes of p-type region which are nearest to the n-type
region first diffuse in the n-type region consequently create a layer of negative
immobile acceptor ions in the p-type region adjacent to the junction. These
positive and negative ions concentration layer creates an electric field across
the junction which is directed from positive to negative that in from n-type side
to p-type side. Now due to presence of this electric field charge carriers in the
crystal experience a force to drift according to the direction of this electric field.
As we know the positive charge always drift in the direction of electric field
hence the positively charged holes (if any) in n-type region now drift to the pside of the junction.

11

On the other hand, negatively charged electrons in p-type region (if any) drift to
n-region as negative charge always drift opposite to the direction of electric
field. Across a p-n junction diffusion and drift of charge carriers continues.
Diffusion of charge carriers creates and increases the thickness of the potential
barrier across the junction and drift of the charge carriers reduces the thickness
of the barrier. In normal thermal equilibrium condition and in absence of any
external force, the diffusion of charge carrier is equal and opposite of drift of
charge carriers hence the thickness of potential barrier remains fixed.
Now the n-type surface of the silicon crystal block is exposed to the sunlight.
Some of the photons are absorbed by the silicon block. Some of the absorbed
photon will have energy greater than the energy gap between valence and
conduction band of valence electrons of the silicon atoms. Hence, some of the
valence electrons in the covalent bond will be excited and jump out from the
bond leaving behind a hole in the bond. In this way electron-hole pairs are
generated in the crystal due to incident light. The holes of these light generated
electron-hole pairs in the n-type side have enough probability of recombination
12

with enormous electrons (majority carriers). Hence, solar cell is so designed,

that the light- generated electrons or holes will not get enough chances to
recombine with majority carriers.
The semiconductor (silicon) is so doped that the p-n junction forms in very
close vicinity of exposed surface of the cell. If an electron hole pair is created
within one minority carrier diffusion length, of the junction, the electrons of
electron-hole pair will drift toward n-type region and hole of the pair will swept
to p region due to in influence of electric field of the junction and hence on the
average, it will contribute to current flow in an external circuit.

Li
g
h
t
n-type
e
semicond
n
p- type
uctor
e
semicond
uctor r
p-ng
juncti
y
on

El
e
ct
ri
c
al
P
o
w
er

Photovoltaic Effect in Semiconductor

13

14

Comparison of Types of solar cell:

Material

Efficiency (%)

Monocrystalline silicon

14-17

Polycrystalline silicon

13-15

Amorphous silicon

5-7

15

ADVANTAGES OF SOLAR CELL:

1.
2.
3.

No pollution associated with it.

It must last for a long time.
No maintenance cost.

DISADVANGES OF SOLAR CELL:

1.
2.
3.

It has high cost of installation.

It has low efficiency.
During cloudy day, the energy cannot be produced and also at night we
will not get solar energy.

Uses of Solar Generation Systems:

1.
2.
3.
4.

It may be used to charge batteries.

Used in light meters.
It is used to power calculators and wrist watches.
It can be used in spacecraft to provide electrical energy.

CONCLUSION:
Though solar cell has some disadvantage associated it, but the disadvantages
are expected to overcome as the technology advances, since the technology is
advancing, the cost of solar plates as well as the installation cost will decrease
down so that everybody can effort to install the system. Furthermore, the
government is laying much emphasis on the solar energy so after some years we
may expect that every household and also every electrical system is powered by
solar or the renewable energy source.

16

REFARENCES
1. WWW.Wikipedia.com
2. Solar Energy by S P Sukhatme, J K Nayak

17