Series interconnected solar cells and solar cells with integrated bypass diode

A solar cell has a photovoltaic output voltage of about 0.5 volt and an output current proportional to cell area. Most present solar cell modules consists of small area cells connected in series to give desired output voltages. As large area substrates become available, e.g. continuously grown ribbons, the current output of a solar cell made from a large substrate becomes excessively large so that the substrate needs to be chopped up, processed and re-interconnected. The work in this thesis describes a practical way of forming series connected solar cells (series integrated array) without cutting up a large substrate. The performance of any solar cell module can be seriously affected by shadowing of a solar cell in a series connected array. The shadowing can not only reduce power out of all proportion to the size of the shadow, but can cause a complete module failure. The problem can be overcome by connecting a bypass diode across each solar cell. A method is described to show the possibility of integrating a bypass diode into the solar cell structure during fabrication with a cost of one or two additional processing steps. Experimental devices were made using the MIS solar cell approach to verify the concepts of the series interconnected solar cell array and the integrated bypass diode.

Grantor dc:publisher

UNSW, Sydney

Year dc:date

1979

Author dc:creator

• Withayachamnankul, W.

• Solar cells
• Diodes
• Semiconductor

Statement dc:rights

• open access
• CC BY-NC-ND 3.0
• free_to_read

Licence

• https://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_abf2
• https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/au/

Language dc:language

EN

Identifier

https://doi.org/10.26190/unsworks/4720

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:unsworks.library.unsw.edu.au:1959.4/55945