8% Efficiency Cu2ZnSn(S,Se)4 (CZTSSe) Thin Film Solar Cells on Flexible and Lightweight Molybdenum Foil Substrates

The use of flexible and highly conducting molybdenum (Mo) foil as a substrate offers several advantages such as a high thermal stability, smooth surface, and chemical inertness for the fabrication of high-efficiency thin film solar cells (TFSCs) by lowering the manufacturing costs. Here, we report a record preliminary efficiency of similar to 8% for sputtered-grown Cu2ZnSn(S,Se)(4) (CZTSSe) TFSCs on flexible and lightweight Mo foils. Careful studies were focused on identifying the role of preparative parameters such as annealing temperature, absorber composition, and post-preparative optimization to bridge the obtained record efficiency of similar to 8% to a previous record efficiency of 7.04% for Na-incorporated CZTSSe sputter-based TFSCs. Interestingly, the preliminary record efficiency of 8% for our CZTSSe device grown via a scalable sputtering method was achieved by optimizing the absorber quality and post-preparative device optimization. While our preliminary results with a record efficiency demonstrate the potential of sputtering method, there is much scope for further improvement in the device efficiency by thoroughly understanding alkali element doping in the absorber layer.