Photovoltaic electrical properties of aqueous grown ZnO antireflective nanostructure on Cu(In,Ga)Se₂ thin film solar cells

A solution-grown subwavelength antireflection coating has been investigated for enhancing the photovoltaic efficiency of thin film solar cells. The 100-nm-height ZnO nanorods coating benefited the photocurrent of Cu(In,Ga)Se₂ solar cells from 31.7 to 34.5 mA/cm² via the decrease of surface light reflectance from 14.5% to 7.0%, contributed by the gradual refractive index profile between air and AZO window layer. The further reduction of surface reflectance to 2.3% in the case of 540-nm-height nanorods, yet, lowered the photocurrent to 29.5 mA/cm², attributed to the decrease in transmittance. The absorption effect of hydrothermal grown ZnO nanorods was explored to optimize the antireflection function in enhancing photovoltaic performances.