Dip Coating of Cu2ZnSnS4 on Flexible Mo foil and its Flexibility measurements

Dinesh, Dinesh and Dey, Suhash Ranjan (2019) Dip Coating of Cu2ZnSnS4 on Flexible Mo foil and its Flexibility measurements. Masters thesis, Indian institute of technology Hyderabad.

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Abstract

The world is in need of energy for its survival and currently we are depleting the fossil fuels for energy production, which leads to increase in the global threat and cost of energy production. Renewable energy sources, especially solar energy has proven to fulfil the energy demands in an eco-friendly way. Hence, production of low cost, earth abundant materials for solar photovoltaics has gained the research interest in the past few decades. Among all the photovoltaic absorber materials, the role of CZTS (Cu2ZnSnS4) is inevitable due to its low cost, earth abundant constituents which also has a direct bandgap of 1.5 eV with a very high absorption coefficient. Variation in annealing parameters aids in better control over composition of individual elements, morphology and crystallinity of near stoichiometric kesterite CZTS thin films. The emergence of flexible and wearable devices, such as electronic textiles, smart watches and patchable sensors, has triggered research on fabrication of solar cells on flexible substrates. One of the basic requirements for these devices is that the integration of individual electronic components must retain flexibility and portability to function in new operational environments. Hence, in the present work, CZTS films are coated on flexible Mo foils and the annealing parameters are optimized. Also, the films are tested for their tensile and bending tests and the elastic and flexural moduli are determined. Also, formation of micro cracks is observed at maximum stress zone in the films after bending, which suggests us that further optimization is needed at different loading conditions in determining the flexibility limit for CZTS films where crack free CZTS films will be obtained after bending, which helps toward unaffected functional applications of CZTS film. After various loading condition, and it should return to its original shape after removal of the load.

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