Engineering topics

Hovel, Harold J.

Publications and source records attributed to Hovel, Harold J..

2 records

DOE OSTI2015

Composites of Upgraded Metallurgical Grade (UMG) Si with Photovoltaic (PV) Grade Si

At the beginning of this project 125 wafers of UMG material blended with non-UMG were obtained in the various blends; 50/50,70/30,80/20. 90/10 and 100% UMG. Solar grade, non-UMG material was used for comparison. Many techniques for starting substrate evaluation were used including lifetime, resitivity, SEM, IPCMS. Some degree of gettering was implemented by lengthening the time of phosphorous diffusion. The UMG/solar blends resulted in 14.5% -15% efficiencies, and even 100% UMG showed 14.5% values, not less than standard cells manufactured at the time and an encouraging result for the prospects of using UMG material due to the lower $/watt. A later decline in the cost of Si and an emphasis on reaching higher efficiencies in general led to a vanishing interest in the use of UMG.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

NASA NTRS1979

Semiconductor structure

A technique for fabricating a semiconductor heterostructure by growth of a ternary semiconductor on a binary semiconductor substrate from a melt of the ternary semiconductor containing less than saturation of at least one common ingredient of both the binary and ternary semiconductors wherein in a single temperature step the binary semiconductor substrate is etched, a p-n junction with specific device characteristics is produced in the binary semiconductor substrate by diffusion of a dopant from the melt and a region of the ternary semiconductor of precise conductivity type and thickness is grown by virtue of a change in the melt characteristics when the etched binary semiconductor enters the melt.

Hovel, Harold J.↗