Growth and characterization of CdS thin films on polymer substrates for photovoltaic applications

In this work, cadmium sulfide (CdS) films were deposited on flexible polymer substrates such as polycarbonate (PC) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET). The r.f. magnetron sputtering, which is cost-effective scalable technique, was used for the film deposition. The structural and optical properties of the films grown at different sputtering pressures were investigated. When the CdS film was deposited at lower pressure, the crystallinity and the preferred orientation toward c-axis in hexagonal phase was improved. However, the optical transmittance was reduced as the sputtering pressure was decreased. Compared with the glass substrate, CdS films grown on polymer substrates were exhibited some wore structural and optical characteristics. CdTe thin film solar cell applied to sputtered CdS as a window layer showed a maximum efficiency of 11.6%.