Short Communication Modeling and optimization of CdS/CuIn 1¡x Ga x Se 2 structure for solar cells applications H. Arbouz a , A. Aissat a,b,* , J.P. Vilcot c a LATSI Laboratory Faculty of Technology, University of Blida 1, BP270, 09.000 Blida, Algeria b LASICOM Laboratory Faculty of Sciences, University of Blida 1, BP270, 09.000 Blida, Algeria c Institut d'Electronique, de Micro electronique et de Nanotechnologie, UMR CNRS 8520, Universit e des Sciences et Technologies de Lille1, Avenue Poincar e, CS 60069, 59652 Villeneuve d'Ascq, France article info Article history: Received 9 March 2016 Received in revised form 10 June 2016 Accepted 11 June 2016 Available online xxx Keywords: Materials Semiconductor Solar cell Photovoltaic abstract This work deals with the modeling and optimization of the CuInGaSe/CdS based structure for photovoltaic applications. We took into consideration the effect of the gallium con- centration and the temperature on the strain, band gap energy, absorption and efficiency of the structure. It has been demonstrated that increasing the gallium concentration in- creases the ban gap energy, while increasing temperature decreases it. These two pa- rameters vary the efficiency significantly. For x ¼ 30% and T ¼ 300 K, the band gap energy is equal to 1.15 eV with a deformation of 0.5% and efficiency around 20%. We have also found that at this value of the band gap energy the structure absorbs most of the incident pho- tons. Then to achieve a reliable cell based on CuInGaSe/CdS it is adequate to find a compromise between the gallium concentration in the alloy, the temperature and the strain. © 2016 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Introduction Currently several research works tend to optimize renewable energy in its many forms like solar thermal, wind, photovol- taic, hydroelectric, …etc [1e3]. The photovoltaic market is dominated by the solar cells of the first generation using crystalline silicon as absorber material, because of its abun- dance in the crust of the earth [4]. Despite this fact, this technology presents some disadvantages as the necessity to use a very pure semiconductor whose thickness is around 200 mm. The emergence of the second generation solar cells based on thin film technology offers the possibility to reduce material cost and open new applications by using thinner absorbers having higher absorption coefficients with very good optoelectronic properties. The most important materials used as thin layer absorbers are amorphous and microcrys- talline silicon, CdS, CdTe, CIGS and CZTS [5]. The hetero junction CIGS(P)eCdS(n) is formed by adding a buffer layer of CdS type n on top of the CIGS absorber. The buffer also pro- tects the CIGS layer during the sputtering process of deposi- tion of the following layers of the cell [6,7]. Actually, the best efficiency recorded for the CIGS solar cell is where the CdS buffer layer is used. But because of its toxicity owing to the presence of Cd, other buffers have been tried and developed * Corresponding author. LATSI Laboratory Faculty of Technology, University of Blida 1, BP270, 09.000 Blida, Algeria. E-mail address: aissaouikader6@gmail.com (A. Aissat). Available online at www.sciencedirect.com ScienceDirect journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/he international journal of hydrogen energy xxx (2016) 1 e6 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhydene.2016.06.104 0360-3199/© 2016 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Please cite this article in press as: Arbouz H, et al., Modeling and optimization of CdS/CuIn 1x Ga x Se 2 structure for solar cells applica- tions, International Journal of Hydrogen Energy (2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhydene.2016.06.104