Improved anisotropic etching process for industrial texturing of silicon solar cells

An experimental study on the surface texturisation of monocrystalline wafers with solutions containing sodium-hydroxide and isopropanol was carried out. Both the composition and the temperature of the etching solution were optimised on the basis of etch-rate measurements on silicon samples having different crystallographic directions. It was found that the density and the size of the pyramids are influenced by the etch-rate of silicon in the [1 0 0] direction and also by the anisotropy factor of the solutions being the quotient of the etch rate in the [1 0 0] to [1 1 1] directions. Design of experiments and response surface methods were used to extract the etch rate as a function of different input parameters, such as the sodium hydroxide and isopropanol concentrations and the temperatures of the solutions. Optimum texturing conditions were found at a temperature of 80 degrees C and a composition which causes a relatively high etch rate in the [1 0 0] direction with an anisotropy factor of 10, At the starting point of the etching process, the inhomogeneity of pyramid nucleation can be avoided by mixing an additive to the texturing solution. With such a solution, the pyramid size can be tuned by varying the etching time in order to obtain a low reflectivity from the textured silicon wafers. Based on our results the texturing process could be stabilised with respect to the reproducibility on a large scale of wafers. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.