Numerical analysis and performance improvement of nanostructured Cu₂O/TiO₂pn heterojunction solar cells using SCAPS

This paper reported numerical analysis and performance improvement of nanostructured Cu₂O/TiO₂pn heterojunction solar cells. Metal oxides thin films including Copper oxides are promising materials for photovoltaic applications. Although, the efficiency is still lower than other solar cells materials. This paper focused on improving the efficiency of Cu₂O/TiO₂ solar cells using SCAPS simulation tool. This was done by varying the effect of film surface thickness and effect of varying deposition temperature on the solar cells. The purpose of the study is to provide a theoretical guide for laboratory research on the improvement of efficiency of Cu₂O metal oxide solar cells. The motivation of the study is that Solar cells with thin absorber surface thickness will result in lower fabrication cost. The solar cells equations were modelled and thereafter theoretical validation of the nanostructured metal oxides was performed. The model used a working points input power of 100 mW/m² with AM1.5 lamp illumination. The modelled solar cell exhibits a short-circuit current (J_sc) of 26.57 mA/cm², 0.7188 V open-circuit voltage (V_oc), fill factor (FF) of 70, and 13.37% efficiency (g). A value of 2.30 eV was recorded for the band gap. Also, electron affinity and Nyquist plot were obtained for the solar cells. This will open a new frontier for modelling of metal oxide based thin films solar cells especially Cu₂O thin films solar cells.