Solar energy has been recognized as an alternative energy source that can help address fuel depletion and climate change issues. As a renewable energy alternative to fossil fuels, it is an eco-friendly and unlimited energy source. Among solar cells, thin film Cu2ZnSn(S,Se)4 (CZTSSe) is currently being actively studied as an alternative to heavily commercialized Cu (In,Ga)Se2 (CIGS) thin film solar cells, which rely upon costly and scarce indium and gallium. Currently, the highest efficiency achieved by CZTSSe cells is 14.9 %, lower than the CIGS record of 23.35 %. When applied to devices, CZTSSe thin films perform poorly compared to other materials due to problems including lattice defects, conduction band offset, secondary phase information, and narrow stable phase regions, so improving their performance is essential. Research into ways of improving performance by doping with Germanium and Cadmium is underway. Specifically, Ge can be doped into CZTSSe, replacing Sn to reduce pinholes and bulk recombination. Additionally, partially replacing Zn with Cd can facilitate grain growth and suppress secondary phase formation. In this study, we analyzed the device’s performance after doping Ge into CZTSSe thin film using evaporation, and doping Cd using chemical bath deposition. The Ge doped thin film showed a larger bandgap than the undoped reference thin film, achieving the highest Voc of 494 mV in the device. The Cd doped thin film showed a smaller bandgap than the undoped reference thin film, with the highest Jsc of 36.9 mA/cm2. As a result, the thin film solar cells achieved a power conversion efficiency of 10.84 %, representing a 20 % improvement in power conversion efficiency compared to the undoped reference device.

The Cu2ZnSn(SxSe1-x)4 (CZTSSe) absorbers are promising thin film solar cells (TFSCs) materials, to replace existing Cu(In,Ga)Se2 (CIGS) and CdTe photovoltaic technology. However, the best reported efficiency for a CZTSSe device, of 13.6 %, is still too low for commercial use. Recently, partially replacing the Zn2+ element with a Cd2+element has attracting attention as one of the promising strategies for improving the photovoltaic characteristics of the CZTSSe TFSCs. Cd2+ elements are known to improve the grain size of the CZTSSe absorber thin films and improve optoelectronic properties by suppressing potential defects, causing short-circuit current (Jsc) loss. In this study, the structural, compositional, and morphological characteristics of CZTSSe and CZCTSSe thin films were investigated using X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-ray fluorescence spectrometer (XRF), and Field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), respectively. The FE-SEM images revealed that the grain size improved with increasing Cd2+ alloying in the CZTSSe thin films. Moreover, there was a slight decrease in small grain distribution as well as voids near the CZTSSe/Mo interface after Cd2+ alloying. The solar cells prepared using the most promising CZTSSe absorber thin films with Cd2+ alloying (8 min. 30 sec.) exhibited a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 9.33 %, Jsc of 34.0 mA/cm2, and fill factor (FF) of 62.7 %, respectively.

Zinc oxide (ZnO) based transparent conducting oxides (TCO) thin films, are used in many applications such as solar cells, flat panel displays, and LEDs due to their wide bandgap nature and excellent electrical properties. In the present work, fluorine and aluminium-doped ZnO targets are prepared and thin films are deposited on soda-lime glass substrate using a RF magnetron sputtering unit. The aluminium concentration is fixed at 2 wt%, and the fluorine concentration is adjusted between 0 to 2.0 wt% with five different concentrations, namely, Al2ZnO98(AZO), F0.5AZO97.5(FAZO1), F1AZO97(FAZO2), F1.5AZO96.5(FAZO3), and F2AZO96(FAZO4). Thin films are deposited with an RF power of 40 W and working pressure of 5 m Torr at 270 oC. The morphological analysis performed for the thin film reveals that surface roughness decreases in FAZO1 and FAZO2 samples when doped with a small amount of fluorine. Further, optical and electrical properties measured for FAZO1 sample show average optical transmissions of over 89 % in the visible region and 82.5 % in the infrared region, followed by low resistivity and sheet resistance of 3.59 × 10−4 Ωcm and 5.52 Ω/sq, respectively. In future, these thin films with excellent optoelectronic properties can be used for thin-film solar cell and other optoelectronics applications.