Optimization of moth‐eye antireflection schemes for silicon solar cells

Abstract

Abstract Nanostructured moth‐eye antireflection schemes for silicon solar cells are simulated using rigorous coupled wave analysis and compared to traditional thin film coatings. The design of the moth‐eye arrays is optimized for application to a laboratory cell (air–silicon interface) and an encapsulated cell (EVA‐silicon interface), and the optimization accounts for the solar spectrum incident on the silicon interface in both cells, and the spectral response of both types of cell. The optimized moth‐eye designs are predicted to outperform an optimized double layer thin film coating by approximately 2% for the laboratory cell and approximately 3% for the encapsulated cell. The predicted performance of the silicon moth‐eye under encapsulation is particularly remarkable as it exhibits losses of only 0·6% compared to an ideal AR surface. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.