New screen-printing line: as if you were there!

As the final stage in the manufacture of solar cells, metallization is a highly challenging process.  Great precision is required to draw electron-collecting lines that are ever thinner and ever more exactly positioned, thus supporting:

- The necessary reduction in silver consumption, which is both an environmental and an economic issue.

- The development and integration of new interconnection technologies for the high efficiencies of today (TOPCon and heterojunction) and tomorrow (perovskite tandem cells on silicon).

Our new screen-printing line, representative of an industrial environment, is ready to handle the largest G12 cell formats (210x210mm) and half-cells, as well as fine thicknesses. It includes on-line measurements (profilometer, electroluminescence and conversion efficiency). Operational for the first time in recent weeks, it incorporates a “Light Soaking” stage, a technology developed by CEA and industrialized by equipment manufacturer Applied Material Europe.

This innovative technology improves photovoltaic yields by using light to “cure” the cells at the end of the process.

The CEA is supporting Gigafactories for the main advanced, high-efficiency photovoltaic cell technologies.

It has launched a vast program to equip its Labfab, operational since 2013 on the INES site, with new capacities. Previously dedicated mainly to heterojunction, this exceptional set of facilities is now multi-technology, prefiguring the industrialization of advanced technologies targeted by French and European gigafactories: heterojunction, TOPCon, and perovskite tandem on silicon for the next generation.