{"id":{"repo_id":"sheffield-hallam","oai_identifier":"oai:shura.shu.ac.uk:19597"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/sheffield-hallam/oai:shura.shu.ac.uk:19597","repository":{"repo_id":"sheffield-hallam","name":"Sheffield Hallam University","base_url":"https://shura.shu.ac.uk/cgi/oai2"},"display":{"title":"Thin film solar cells using all-electrodeposited ZnS, CdS and CdTe materials.","abstract":"The urgent global need for affordable alternative and clean energy supply has triggered extensive research on the development of thin-film solar cells since the past few decades. This has necessitated the search for low-cost, scalable and manufacturable thin-film semiconductor deposition techniques which in turn has led to the research on electrodeposition technique as a possible candidate for the deposition of semiconductor materials and the fabrication of thin-film solar cells using these materials.Electronic quality ZnS, CdS, and CdTe thin layers have been successfully electrodeposited from aqueous solutions on glass/fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO) substrates, using simplified two-electrode system instead of the conventional three-electrode system. This process was also carried out in a normal physical chemistry laboratory instead of the conventional cleanroom that is very expensive to maintain. The electrodeposited materials were characterised for their structural, optical, electrical, morphological and compositional properties using x-ray diffraction, optical absorption, photoelectrochemical cell, current-voltage, scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive x-ray techniques respectively. The results show that amorphous n-type and p-type ZnS layers were deposited by varying the concentrations of Zn[2+] and S[2-] in the deposition electrolyte. The CdS layers show hexagonal structure with n-type electrical conduction while CdTe layers show cubic structure with n-type electrical conduction, in the cathodic deposition potential range explored.Using CdTe as the main absorber material, fully fabricated solar cell structures of the n-n hetero-junction + large Schottky barrier type were fabricated instead of the conventional p-n junction type structure. Conventional post-deposition CdCl[2] treatment of CdTe rather carried out with a mixture of CdCl[2] and CdF[2], resulted in pronounced improvement of all the device parameters. Characterisation of the fully fabricated solar cells was done using current-voltage and capacitance-voltage techniques. Promising device parameters were obtained for the best devices, with barrier heights greater than (1.00 - 1.13) eV, short-circuit current densities of (20 - 48) mAcm[-2], open-circuit voltages of (500 - 670) mV, fill factors of (0.33 - 0.47) and overall conversion efficiencies of (5.0 - 12.0)%. Remarkably, the two highest efficiency figures of 10.4% and 12.0% came up for solar cells involving ZnS as buffer layer and window layer with the structures, glass/FTO/n-ZnS/n-CdS/n-CdTe/Au and glass/FTO/n-ZnS/n-CdTe/Au, respectively. At present, the reproducibility and consistency of these devices is poor, but these results demonstrate that these devices structures have the potential to achieve efficiency values over 20% when fully optimised.","abstract_html":"The urgent global need for affordable alternative and clean energy supply has triggered extensive research on the development of thin-film solar cells since the past few decades. This has necessitated the search for low-cost, scalable and manufacturable thin-film semiconductor deposition techniques which in turn has led to the research on electrodeposition technique as a possible candidate for the deposition of semiconductor materials and the fabrication of thin-film solar cells using these materials.Electronic quality ZnS, CdS, and CdTe thin layers have been successfully electrodeposited from aqueous solutions on glass/fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO) substrates, using simplified two-electrode system instead of the conventional three-electrode system. This process was also carried out in a normal physical chemistry laboratory instead of the conventional cleanroom that is very expensive to maintain. The electrodeposited materials were characterised for their structural, optical, electrical, morphological and compositional properties using x-ray diffraction, optical absorption, photoelectrochemical cell, current-voltage, scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive x-ray techniques respectively. The results show that amorphous n-type and p-type ZnS layers were deposited by varying the concentrations of Zn[2+] and S[2-] in the deposition electrolyte. The CdS layers show hexagonal structure with n-type electrical conduction while CdTe layers show cubic structure with n-type electrical conduction, in the cathodic deposition potential range explored.Using CdTe as the main absorber material, fully fabricated solar cell structures of the n-n hetero-junction + large Schottky barrier type were fabricated instead of the conventional p-n junction type structure. Conventional post-deposition CdCl[2] treatment of CdTe rather carried out with a mixture of CdCl[2] and CdF[2], resulted in pronounced improvement of all the device parameters. Characterisation of the fully fabricated solar cells was done using current-voltage and capacitance-voltage techniques. Promising device parameters were obtained for the best devices, with barrier heights greater than (1.00 - 1.13) eV, short-circuit current densities of (20 - 48) mAcm[-2], open-circuit voltages of (500 - 670) mV, fill factors of (0.33 - 0.47) and overall conversion efficiencies of (5.0 - 12.0)%. Remarkably, the two highest efficiency figures of 10.4% and 12.0% came up for solar cells involving ZnS as buffer layer and window layer with the structures, glass/FTO/n-ZnS/n-CdS/n-CdTe/Au and glass/FTO/n-ZnS/n-CdTe/Au, respectively. At present, the reproducibility and consistency of these devices is poor, but these results demonstrate that these devices structures have the potential to achieve efficiency values over 20% when fully optimised.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Echendu, Obi Kingsley."],"institution":"Sheffield Hallam University (United Kingdom).","degree_name":"phd","degree_level":"doctoral","degree_discipline":null,"degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":[],"advisors":["Dharmadasa, I","Young, Andrew E"],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2014,"date_issued":"2014","date_published":"2014","updated_at":"2026-07-24T06:31:21Z","subjects":[],"languages":["en"],"rights":[],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":null,"outbound_label":null,"outbound_source":null},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor.advisor","label":"Advisor","values":["Dharmadasa, I","Young, Andrew E"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Echendu, Obi Kingsley."]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2014"]},{"key":"dc:date.issued","label":"Date","values":["2014"]},{"key":"dc:publisher.commercial","label":"Dc Publisher Commercial","values":["Sheffield Hallam University,"]},{"key":"dc:publisher.department","label":"Dc Publisher Department","values":["Department Not Provided."]},{"key":"dc:publisher.institution","label":"Dc Publisher Institution","values":["Sheffield Hallam University (United Kingdom)."]},{"key":"dc:relation.isreferencedby","label":"Dc Relation Isreferencedby","values":["https://shura.shu.ac.uk/19597/"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["Thesis"]},{"key":"dc:type.qualificationlevel","label":"Dc Type Qualificationlevel","values":["doctoral"]},{"key":"dc:type.qualificationname","label":"Dc Type Qualificationname","values":["phd"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier.uri","label":"Identifier URI","values":["https://shura.shu.ac.uk/19597/1/10694478.pdf"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["The urgent global need for affordable alternative and clean energy supply has triggered extensive research on the development of thin-film solar cells since the past few decades. This has necessitated the search for low-cost, scalable and manufacturable thin-film semiconductor deposition techniques which in turn has led to the research on electrodeposition technique as a possible candidate for the deposition of semiconductor materials and the fabrication of thin-film solar cells using these materials.Electronic quality ZnS, CdS, and CdTe thin layers have been successfully electrodeposited from aqueous solutions on glass/fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO) substrates, using simplified two-electrode system instead of the conventional three-electrode system. This process was also carried out in a normal physical chemistry laboratory instead of the conventional cleanroom that is very expensive to maintain. The electrodeposited materials were characterised for their structural, optical, electrical, morphological and compositional properties using x-ray diffraction, optical absorption, photoelectrochemical cell, current-voltage, scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive x-ray techniques respectively. The results show that amorphous n-type and p-type ZnS layers were deposited by varying the concentrations of Zn[2+] and S[2-] in the deposition electrolyte. The CdS layers show hexagonal structure with n-type electrical conduction while CdTe layers show cubic structure with n-type electrical conduction, in the cathodic deposition potential range explored.Using CdTe as the main absorber material, fully fabricated solar cell structures of the n-n hetero-junction + large Schottky barrier type were fabricated instead of the conventional p-n junction type structure. Conventional post-deposition CdCl[2] treatment of CdTe rather carried out with a mixture of CdCl[2] and CdF[2], resulted in pronounced improvement of all the device parameters. Characterisation of the fully fabricated solar cells was done using current-voltage and capacitance-voltage techniques. Promising device parameters were obtained for the best devices, with barrier heights greater than (1.00 - 1.13) eV, short-circuit current densities of (20 - 48) mAcm[-2], open-circuit voltages of (500 - 670) mV, fill factors of (0.33 - 0.47) and overall conversion efficiencies of (5.0 - 12.0)%. Remarkably, the two highest efficiency figures of 10.4% and 12.0% came up for solar cells involving ZnS as buffer layer and window layer with the structures, glass/FTO/n-ZnS/n-CdS/n-CdTe/Au and glass/FTO/n-ZnS/n-CdTe/Au, respectively. At present, the reproducibility and consistency of these devices is poor, but these results demonstrate that these devices structures have the potential to achieve efficiency values over 20% when fully optimised."]},{"key":"dc:format","label":"Dc Format","values":["application/pdf"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["Thin film solar cells using all-electrodeposited ZnS, CdS and CdTe materials."]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor.advisor":["Dharmadasa, I","Young, Andrew E"],"dc:creator":["Echendu, Obi Kingsley."],"dc:date":["2014"],"dc:date.issued":["2014"],"dc:description.abstract":["The urgent global need for affordable alternative and clean energy supply has triggered extensive research on the development of thin-film solar cells since the past few decades. This has necessitated the search for low-cost, scalable and manufacturable thin-film semiconductor deposition techniques which in turn has led to the research on electrodeposition technique as a possible candidate for the deposition of semiconductor materials and the fabrication of thin-film solar cells using these materials.Electronic quality ZnS, CdS, and CdTe thin layers have been successfully electrodeposited from aqueous solutions on glass/fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO) substrates, using simplified two-electrode system instead of the conventional three-electrode system. This process was also carried out in a normal physical chemistry laboratory instead of the conventional cleanroom that is very expensive to maintain. The electrodeposited materials were characterised for their structural, optical, electrical, morphological and compositional properties using x-ray diffraction, optical absorption, photoelectrochemical cell, current-voltage, scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive x-ray techniques respectively. The results show that amorphous n-type and p-type ZnS layers were deposited by varying the concentrations of Zn[2+] and S[2-] in the deposition electrolyte. The CdS layers show hexagonal structure with n-type electrical conduction while CdTe layers show cubic structure with n-type electrical conduction, in the cathodic deposition potential range explored.Using CdTe as the main absorber material, fully fabricated solar cell structures of the n-n hetero-junction + large Schottky barrier type were fabricated instead of the conventional p-n junction type structure. Conventional post-deposition CdCl[2] treatment of CdTe rather carried out with a mixture of CdCl[2] and CdF[2], resulted in pronounced improvement of all the device parameters. Characterisation of the fully fabricated solar cells was done using current-voltage and capacitance-voltage techniques. Promising device parameters were obtained for the best devices, with barrier heights greater than (1.00 - 1.13) eV, short-circuit current densities of (20 - 48) mAcm[-2], open-circuit voltages of (500 - 670) mV, fill factors of (0.33 - 0.47) and overall conversion efficiencies of (5.0 - 12.0)%. Remarkably, the two highest efficiency figures of 10.4% and 12.0% came up for solar cells involving ZnS as buffer layer and window layer with the structures, glass/FTO/n-ZnS/n-CdS/n-CdTe/Au and glass/FTO/n-ZnS/n-CdTe/Au, respectively. At present, the reproducibility and consistency of these devices is poor, but these results demonstrate that these devices structures have the potential to achieve efficiency values over 20% when fully optimised."],"dc:format":["application/pdf"],"dc:identifier.uri":["https://shura.shu.ac.uk/19597/1/10694478.pdf"],"dc:language":["en"],"dc:publisher.commercial":["Sheffield Hallam University,"],"dc:publisher.department":["Department Not Provided."],"dc:publisher.institution":["Sheffield Hallam University (United Kingdom)."],"dc:relation.isreferencedby":["https://shura.shu.ac.uk/19597/"],"dc:title":["Thin film solar cells using all-electrodeposited ZnS, CdS and CdTe materials."],"dc:type":["Thesis"],"dc:type.qualificationlevel":["doctoral"],"dc:type.qualificationname":["phd"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-24T06:31:21Z"}