Novel dielectrics compounds grown by atomic layer deposition as sustainable materials for chalcogenides thin-films photovoltaics technologies

Thin-film solar cells have the potential to require only a fraction of the material, and energy in comparison to the widely used silicon cells, deserving attention of the scientific community. Indeed, thin-film solar cells of Cu(In,Ga)Se2 (CIGS) and CZTS offer the highest Schokley-Queisser limit, above to the level achieved with c-Si cells. Besides being essential competitors, CIGS and CZTS solar cells have additional advantages compared to Si cells, such as the possibility of fabricating flexible modules, having a coefficient of temperature lower than the one of Si, a higher response under low irradiance conditions and lower production costs even with low CAPEX investments. Also, all these advantages make CIGS and CZTS technology a compelling candidate for several applications other than flat modules like, for instance, building-integrated PV. The current efficiency for CIGS solar cells is 23.35% and CZTS is 10.0%, and Shockley–Quessey limit is 33% and 32.4%, respectively, so there is still a high potential for the development of the thin-films solar cell architecture.