Key success factors and future perspective of silicon based solar cells

Today, after more than 70 years of continued development on silicon, about 85% of cumulative installed PV modules are based on crystalline silicon (c-Si) technology. PV devices based on silicon are the most common solar cells currently being produced and it is mainly due to silicon technology that the PV has grown by 40% per year over the last decade. An additional step in the silicon solar cell development is on-going and it is related to a further efficiency improvement through defect control, device optimization, surface modification, nanotechnology approaches. This article attempts to briefly review the most important advances and current technologies used to produce crystalline silicon solar devices and in the meantime the most challenging and promising strategies acting to increase the ratio between the efficiency and the cost of silicon solar cells. Eventually, the impact and the potentiality of using a nanotechnology approach in a silicon based solar cell is also described.