17.9% Metal-wrap-through mc-Si cells resulting in module efficiency of 17.0

ABSTRACT We obtained 17.9% cell efficiency on thin and large mc‐Si REC wafers using ECN's metal‐wrap‐through (MWT) concept. Optimization of several cell processing steps led to an increase of more than 2% absolute in cell efficiency. With these cells 36‐cell modules were manufactured at 100% yield in our industry scale module pilot line. The highest module efficiency obtained (as independently confirmed by JRC‐ESTI) was 17%. In this module the average cell efficiency was 17.8%; this shows a small difference between cell and module efficiency. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 17.9% cell efficiency on thin and large mc‐Si REC wafers using ECN's metal‐wrap‐through (MWT) concept was obtained by optimizing several cell processing steps. With these cells 36‐cell back‐contacted modules were manufactured at 100% yield in ECN's industry scale module pilot line. The highest module efficiency obtained was 17%, which was the world record in early 2010.