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Light harvesting enhancement in solar cells with quasicrystalline plasmonic structures

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Abstract

Solar cells are important in the area of renewable energies. Since it is expensive to produce solar-grade silicon [Electrochem. Soc. Interface 17, 30 (2008)], especially thin-film solar cells are interesting. However, the efficiency of such solar cells is low. Therefore, it is important to increase the efficiency. The group of Polman has shown that a periodic arrangement of metal particles is able to enhance the absorbance of light [Nano Lett. 11, 1760 (2011)]. However, a quasicrystalline arrangement of the metal particles is expected to enhance the light absorbance independent of the incident polar and azimuthal angles due to the more isotropic photonic bandstructure. In this paper, we compare the absorption enhancement of a quasiperiodic photonic crystal to that of a periodic photonic crystal. We indeed find that the absorption enhancement for the quasicrystalline arrangement shows such an isotropic behavior. This implies that the absorption efficiency of the solar cell is relatively constant during the course of the day as well as the year. This is particularly important with respect to power distribution, power storage requirements, and the stability of the electric grid upon massive use of renewable energy.

©2013 Optical Society of America

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Figures (5)

Fig. 1
Fig. 1 Sample design with (a) a quasiperiodic arrangement as well as (b) a periodic arrangement of gold disks on top of a SiO2/Si/SiO2-substrate.
Fig. 2
Fig. 2 S-matrix calculated (a) transmittance and (b) reflectance spectra (black solid lines) as well as the corresponding Fano modelled spectra (red dashed lines) for a periodic gold disk arrangement.
Fig. 3
Fig. 3 Polarization dependent absorbance spectra for (a) p- and (b) s-polarized light of a Penrose tiling as well as (c) p- and (d) s-polarized light of a square lattice for an angle of incidence θ = 6°. The azimuthal angle ϕ was changed between 0° and 90°.
Fig. 4
Fig. 4 Angle dependent absorbance spectra for (a) p- and (b) s-polarized light of a Penrose tiling as well as (c) p- and (d) s-polarized light of a square lattice. The part from Γ to N belongs to an azimuthal angle of 18° and the part from Γ to M to ϕ = 45°. The part from Γ to X belongs to an azimuthal angle of 0°.
Fig. 5
Fig. 5 Enhancement factor versus day of the year and local time for (a) a Penrose tiling as well as for (b) a square lattice. The colored lines in (a) and (b) show the cross sections of the enhancement factor for specific local times, which is plotted versus the day of the year for (c) a Penrose tiling and (d) a square lattice. The inset in (d) shows the course of the sun for three different days of the year.

Equations (8)

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t= t d exp(i ϕ t ) t Pl Γ Pl exp(i ϕ Pl ) E E Pl +i Γ Pl C k t k Γ k exp(i ϕ k ) E E k +i Γ k ,
r= r d exp(i ϕ r )+ r Pl Γ Pl exp(i ϕ Pl ) E E Pl +i Γ Pl +C k r k Γ k exp(i ϕ k ) E E k +i Γ k
t d =1.33700.8147E+0.3420 E 2 0.0575 E 3 ,
r d =0.0325+0.7545E0.2046 E 2 +0.0053 E 3 .
A avg = λ min λ g A tot (λ)S(λ)dλ
A tot (λ)= A ppol (λ)+ A spol (λ) 2 .
EF= A avg,enh A avg,Bare ,
E F tot = 1 365 0 24 A avg,enh d t LT d t day 1 365 0 24 A avg,Bare d t LT d t day .
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