Research carried out into crystalline silicon technology considers various possibilities for reducing manufacturing costs. The first consists of decreasing the thickness of the wafers by reducing the substrate to around 100 microns. Once the problems of handling and cutting ultrathin wafers have been overcome, module costs will be reduced by about 25%.
The second possibility considers the use of a more economic raw material exclusive to the photovoltaic industry, solar-grade silicon, which is obtained by purifying silicon using metallurgical methods. It also considers the development of silicon-wafer manufacturing processes through epitaxial growth on low-quality metallurgical silicon substrates.
Finally, the third possibility for reducing costs is to increase the efficiency of the devices by adapting high-efficiency technologies to the mass-production requirements (e.g. selective emitters, surface and volume passivation, rear contacts, and new concepts in metallising and encapsulation).
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