Publications by Xavier Niquille

Localisation of front side passivating contacts for direct metallisation of high-efficiency c-Si solar cells

Christophe Ballif, Sylvain Nicolay, Xavier Niquille, Franz-Josef Haug, Frank Meyer, Andrea Ingenito

In this work, we present the development of passivating contacts based on thin interfacial oxide/doped polysilicon for two side contacted c-Si solar cells. In the first part, we discuss our layer optimization towards direct metallisation, using firing thro ...

ELSEVIER2022

Industrialization of hybrid Si/III-V and translucent planar micro-tracking modules

Christophe Ballif, Xavier Niquille, Matthieu Despeisse

A tracking-integrated hybrid micro-concentrator module is presented that can harvest direct, diffuse, and albedo irradiance components. It uses biconvex 180x lens arrays to concentrate direct light on high-efficiency III-V solar cells (29% module efficienc ...

WILEY2021

Optimization of front SiNx/ITO stacks for high-efficiency two-side contacted c-Si solar cells with co-annealed front and rear passivating contacts

Christophe Ballif, Sylvain Nicolay, Xavier Niquille, Franz-Josef Haug, Frank Meyer, Andrea Ingenito

In this contribution, we present an electron selective passivating contact metallised with a low temperature process to target front side applications in crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar cells. In addition to an interfacial silicon oxide (SiOx) and an in-s ...

2020

A Mixed-Phase SiOx Hole Selective Junction Compatible With High Temperatures Used in Industrial Solar Cell Manufacturing

Christophe Ballif, Quentin Thomas Jeangros, Philippe Wyss, Xavier Niquille, Franz-Josef Haug, Matthieu Despeisse, Mario Joe Lehmann, Iris Anita Mack, Gizem Nogay, Josua Andreas Stückelberger, Andrea Ingenito

We present a p-type passivating rear contact that complies with integration into standard solar cell manufacturing with phosphorus-diffused front side. Our contact structure consists of a thin SiOx tunneling layer grown by wet chemistry and a stack of laye ...

IEEE-INST ELECTRICAL ELECTRONICS ENGINEERS INC2020

Passivating electron contact based on highly crystalline nanostructured silicon oxide layers for silicon solar cells

Christophe Ballif, Quentin Thomas Jeangros, Philippe Wyss, Xavier Niquille, Franz-Josef Haug, Matthieu Despeisse, Gizem Nogay, Martin Ledinsky, Philipp Friedrich Hermann Löper, Josua Andreas Stückelberger

We present a novel passivating contact structure based on a nanostructured silicon-based layer. Traditional poly-Si junctions feature excellent junction characteristics but their optical absorption induces current losses when applied to the solar cell fron ...

Elsevier Science Bv2016

Zinc tin oxide as high-temperature stable recombination layer for mesoscopic perovskite/silicon monolithic tandem solar cells

Christophe Ballif, Sylvain Nicolay, Soo-Jin Moon, Arnaud Walter, Davide Sacchetto, Stefaan De Wolf, Xavier Niquille, Jérémie Werner, Monica Morales Masis, Björn Niesen, Philipp Friedrich Hermann Löper, Oscar Esteban Rucavado Leandro

Perovskite/crystalline silicon tandem solar cells have the potential to reach efficiencies beyond those of silicon single-junction record devices. However, the high-temperature process of 500 °C needed for state-of-the-art mesoscopic perovskite cells has, ...

American Institute of Physics2016

Silicon-Rich Silicon Carbide Hole-Selective Rear Contacts for Crystalline-Silicon-Based Solar Cells

Christophe Ballif, Quentin Thomas Jeangros, Philippe Wyss, Xavier Niquille, Franz-Josef Haug, Matthieu Despeisse, Gizem Nogay, Philipp Friedrich Hermann Löper, Josua Andreas Stückelberger

The use of passivating contacts compatible with typical homojunction thermal processes is one of the most promising approaches to realizing high-efficiency silicon solar cells. In this work, we investigate an alternative rear-passivating contact targeting ...

2016

High-Stable-Efficiency Tandem Thin-Film Silicon Solar Cell With Low-Refractive-Index Silicon-Oxide Interlayer

Christophe Ballif, Grégory Bugnon, Xavier Niquille, Mathieu Gérard Boccard, Matthieu Despeisse, Jordi Escarre Palou, Maximilien Joseph Marie Bonnet-Eymard

We report the recent advances and key requirements for high-efficiency "micromorph" tandem thin-film silicon solar cells composed of an amorphous silicon top cell and a microcrystalline silicon bottom cell. The impact of inserting a low-refractive-index si ...

Ieee-Inst Electrical Electronics Engineers Inc2014

Enhancement of microcrystalline n-i-p solar cell performance via use of pre-covering layers and H-2 treatment

Christophe Ballif, Xavier Niquille, Vanessa Terrazzoni-Daudrix, Franz-Josef Haug

We study the effects of a-Si:H and mu c-Si:H covering layers and an H-2 treatment on the characteristics of mu c-Si:H thin film solar cells deposited in open single chamber very high frequency plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition systems. Secondary io ...

Elsevier2011

Development of micromorph tandem soalr cells on flexible low cost plastic substrates

Christophe Ballif, Martin Python, Thomas Söderström, Xavier Niquille, Vanessa Terrazzoni-Daudrix, Franz-Josef Haug

We report on the development of fully flexible microcrystalline and micromorph tandem solar cells directly on low-cost substrates like poly-ethylen-terephtalate (PET) and poly-ethylen-naphtalate (PEN). The cells are deposited in nip or nip/nip configuratio ...

2009

Asymmetric intermediate reflector for tandem micromorph thin film silicon solar cells

Christophe Ballif, Thomas Söderström, Xavier Niquille, Vanessa Terrazzoni-Daudrix, Franz-Josef Haug

The micromorph solar cell (stack of amorphous and microcrystalline cells) concept is the key for achieving high efficiency stabilized thin film silicon solar cells. We introduce a device structure that allows a better control of the light in-coupling into ...

AIP American Institute of Physics2009