TNO-Solliance & Swansea Uni Manufacturing and testing facilities

Dr. Natalia Maticiuc Viperlab Project Technical Manager introduces the project and the webinar

The TNO-Solliance - S25 Process PSK Line , is an advanced infrastructure that  offers great opportunites:

• Sheet-to-sheet process line for perovskite solar cells and modules (6x6 inch2) based on industrial compatible processes (slot die, xALD, sputter, laser interconnect, encapsulation
• Manufacturing of rigid, flexible and opaque or semi-transparent (or translucent) modules

New material can be tested with scalable process on cell and module level and the loss of upscaling can be analysed as the area of device increases by about 4 orders magnitude; from the size of typical lab cells (in the order of square millimetres) to 6-inch modules. The infrastructure can also be utilized to manufacture a set of nearly identical perovskite modules to support other research purposes, e.g. outdoor testing, demonstrators, prototypes, tandem devices, etc.

In addition, next to rigid substrates, the line can also handle flexible substrates and can thus be utilized to process flexible perovskite modules, and  there is know-how for making perovskite cells directly on silicon wafers and devices with extremely high near-infrared transparency. This enables the manufacturing of two terminal and four terminal devices.

Further information can be found here

Infrastructure video presentation here  

Swansea University - PV manufacturing and Testing Facilities infrastructure offers state-of-the-art fabrication and characterisation equipment for the printing and testing of solar cells devices with focused on solution processed OPV and perovskites devices. The cleanroom is a humidity and atmospheric controlled environment facility which contains an area a class 1000, and a class 10,000 area. The cleanroom facilities houses all the equipment required for making devices solar cells: 3 Gloveboxes , top-bench coater (i.e. Slot-die coater), screen printers, slot-die R2R coater, NIR drying ovens, and other basic solar cell building infrastructure (spin-coater, hotplates, etc…).

In addition, it has a suite of state-of-the-art device and material characterisation equipment includes FEGSEM, XPS, XRD, FTIR, Raman, SKP-AFM, UV-Vis and Emission Spectroscopy, Phosphorescence Spectroscopy, Fluorescence Microscopy, ns-transient absorption spectroscopy (TAS) and TRPL. Materials can be tested using independent or hyphenated thermal analysis STA-FTIR-GCMS) as well as their Nano mechanical behaviour through tribo-indentation.
The infrastructure offers full characterization of solar cells by AAA solar simulators, quantum efficiency (QE) apparatus, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS), cyclic voltammetry and optoelectronic transient and charge extraction measurements. The extensive facilities for lifetime analysis include bespoke capabilities for in-situ testing of materials and devices with the ability to independently vary oxygen, humidity, light and temperature whilst applying any necessary bias.
Module testing can be undertake using a range of cyclic humidity cabinets an Atlas weatherometers, and via QUVA/B, Xenon arc, and a capability also exists for external weathering as part of o PV analysis setup- This is a capability only held by a small number of research institutions active in the field.

Further information can be found here

Infrastructure video presentation here