Publications by Christophe Ballif

Related publications (427)

Corrosion testing of solar cells: Wear-out degradation behavior

Christophe Ballif, Alessandro Francesco Aldo Virtuani, Andrew Wayne Fairbrother, Luca Gnocchi

Corrosion is one of the main end-of-life degradation and failure modes in photovoltaic (PV) modules. However, it is a gradual process and can take many years to become a major risk factor because of the slow accumulation of water and acetic acid (from enca ...

ELSEVIER2022

Lateral ion migration accelerates degradation in halide perovskite devices

Christophe Ballif, Quentin Thomas Jeangros, Kerem Artuk, Christian Michael Wolff, Xin Yu Chin, Daniel Anthony Jacobs

The migration of mobile ions has long been considered a source of performance degradation in devices based on halide perovskites, but details regarding the mechanisms and extent of this problem remain scarce. Here we report the finding that differences in ...

ROYAL SOC CHEMISTRY2022

Thermo-mechanical stability of lightweight glass-free photovoltaic modules based on a composite substrate

Christophe Ballif, Laure-Emmanuelle Perret Aebi, Alessandro Francesco Aldo Virtuani, Hengyu Li, Valentin Chapuis, Ana Cristina Oliveira Martins

Lightweight PV modules are attractive for building-integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) applications, especially for renovated buildings, where the additional load bearing capacity is limited. This work focuses on the development of a lightweight, glass-free pho ...

ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV2018

Temperature dependence of hydrogenated amorphous silicon solar cell performances

Christophe Ballif, Franz-Josef Haug, Michael Elias Stückelberger, Yannick Samuel Riesen

Thin-film hydrogenated amorphous silicon solar (a-Si:H) cells are known to have better temperature coefficients than crystalline silicon cells. To investigate whether a-Si:H cells that are optimized for standard conditions (STC) also have the highest energ ...

American Institute of Physics2016

Design Rules to Fully Benefit From Bifaciality in Two-Terminal Perovskite/Silicon Tandem Solar Cells

Christophe Ballif, Mathieu Gérard Boccard, Quentin Thomas Jeangros, Olivier Denis Dupré, Arttu Matias Tuomiranta

The photovoltaics industry is adopting bifacial systems which offer improved energy harvesting compared to monofacial ones. This stems from the collection of light reflected by the surroundings on the rear side of the modules, leading to system-level gains ...

2020

Accurate color characterization of solar photovoltaic modules for building integration

Christophe Ballif, Antonin Faes, Alessandro Francesco Aldo Virtuani, Jordi Escarre Palou, Alejandro Borja Block

Accurate and reproducible color characterization is essential for colored building integrated photovoltaic products, both for manufacturing quality control and assessing long-term color stability. However, existing characterization techniques struggle to a ...

Pergamon-Elsevier Science Ltd2023

Enhancing lifetime, forecasting, and economic benefits of photovoltaic technologies undergoing UV-induced degradation with optical filtering

Christophe Ballif, Antonin Faes, Christian Michael Wolff, Marion Solange Madeleine Dussouillez

Ultraviolet-induced degradation (UV-ID) of various PV cell types was analyzed under optical UV filters with different cutoff wavelengths. Cell types studied included interdigitated back contact (IBC), passivated emitter and rear totally diffused (PERT), an ...

2025

Passivating electron contact based on highly crystalline nanostructured silicon oxide layers for silicon solar cells

Christophe Ballif, Franz-Josef Haug, Matthieu Despeisse, Quentin Thomas Jeangros, Gizem Nogay, Xavier Niquille, Philipp Friedrich Hermann Löper, Josua Andreas Stückelberger, Philippe Wyss, Martin Ledinsky

We present a novel passivating contact structure based on a nanostructured silicon-based layer. Traditional poly-Si junctions feature excellent junction characteristics but their optical absorption induces current losses when applied to the solar cell fron ...

Elsevier Science Bv2016

Zr-doped indium oxide electrodes: Annealing and thickness effects on microstructure and carrier transport

Christophe Ballif, Aïcha Hessler-Wyser, Mathieu Gérard Boccard, Quentin Thomas Jeangros, Monica Morales Masis, Oscar Esteban Rucavado Leandro, Federica Landucci

Zr-doped indium oxide (In2O3:Zr) has been shown to satisfy the requirements of low resistance, wide band gap, and high infrared transmittance for application as a front contact in broadband solar cells. However, the reduction of indium usage in front of tr ...

AMER PHYSICAL SOC2019

Field test and electrode optimization of electrodynamic cleaning systems for solar panels

Christophe Ballif, Aïcha Hessler-Wyser, Matthieu Despeisse, Nicolas Würsch, Antonin Faes, Jacques Levrat

Soiling is the major cause of power loss of photovoltaics (PV) and concentrated solar power (CSP) in desert areas. Electrodynamic cleaning system (EDS) is an automatic and water-free integrated cleaning system for mirrors or solar panels, which uses pulsed ...

WILEY2019

Carrier transport and sensitivity issues in heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer solar cells on N-type crystalline silicon: A computer simulation study

Christophe Ballif, Anwitaman Datta

Heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer or HIT solar cells are considered favorable for large-scale manufacturing of solar modules, as they combine the high efficiency of crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar cells, with the low cost of amorphous silicon techn ...

American Institute of Physics2010

Contact Resistivity Measurements and their Applicability for Accurate Series Resistance Breakdown in Heterojunction Solar Cell

Christophe Ballif, Matthieu Despeisse, Mathieu Gérard Boccard, Luca Massimiliano Antognini, Julie Amandine Dreon, Bertrand Yves Paul Paviet-Salomon, Deniz Türkay, Laurie-Lou Senaud

In this work, we use several approaches to perform accurate Series Resistance (R-S) breakdown of a state of the art 2 cm x 2 cm screen-printed solar cell reaching 82.5% FF. On the one hand, Haschke et al.'s model for the lateral transport through the cell, ...

AMER INST PHYSICS2022

Fast and non-destructive detection on the EVA gel content in photovoltaic modules by optical reflection

Christophe Ballif, Laure-Emmanuelle Perret Aebi, Hengyu Li

Poly(ethylene-co-vinyl acetate) (EVA) has been the dominating material in the photovoltaic (PV) encapsulant market for decades, owing to its superior cost-performance balance. To achieve its desired material properties, EVA undergoes a curing reaction duri ...

Ieee-Inst Electrical Electronics Engineers Inc2015

Comparison of amorphous silicon absorber materials: Kinetics of light-induced degradation

Christophe Ballif, Franz-Josef Haug, Matthieu Despeisse, Mathieu Gérard Boccard, Michael Elias Stückelberger, Yannick Samuel Riesen

We investigate the influence of the deposition parameters for intrinsic amorphous silicon absorber layers on light-induced degradation (LID) of thin-film silicon solar cells. The focus is on absorber layers with different bandgaps: on one side, solar cells ...

Wiley-Blackwell2016

Promoting a Sustainable Diffusion of Solar PV Electricity in Africa: Results of the CODEV Project

Christophe Ballif, Alessandro Francesco Aldo Virtuani, Eleonora Annigoni

In this work we present the result of a collaboration between the Polytechnic Schools of Dakar (ESP) and Lausanne (EPFL) on the testing and monitoring of solar photovoltaic modules. The collaboration has involved the exchange of knowledge, methodologies an ...

2017

Intrinsic performance loss rate: Decoupling reversible and irreversible losses for an improved assessment of photovoltaic system performance

Christophe Ballif, Alessandro Francesco Aldo Virtuani, Hugo James André Quest

Solar electricity is set to play a pivotal role in future energy systems. In view of a market that may soon reach the terawatt (TW) scale, a careful assessment of the performance of photovoltaic (PV) systems becomes critical. Research on PV fault detection ...

Wiley2024

Toward Stable Monolithic Perovskite/Silicon Tandem Photovoltaics: A Six-Month Outdoor Performance Study in a Hot and Humid Climate

Christophe Ballif, Quentin Thomas Jeangros, Stefaan De Wolf

Perovskite/silicon tandem solar cells are emerging as a high-efficiency and prospectively cost-effective solar technology with great promise for deployment at the utility scale. However, despite the remarkable performance progress reported lately, assuring ...

AMER CHEMICAL SOC2021

Potential-induced degradation in bifacial silicon heterojunction solar modules: Insights and mitigation strategies

Christophe Ballif, Quentin Thomas Jeangros, Alessandro Francesco Aldo Virtuani, Luca Gnocchi, Olatz Arriaga Arruti

Potential-induced degradation (PID) may be a serious concern in photovoltaic (PV) modules and plants, particularly when approaching high system voltages (1500+ V). Here, we investigate PID occurring in bifacial rear-emitter silicon heterojunction (SHJ) sol ...

Wiley2023

Exploring co-sputtering of ZnO:Al and SiO2 for efficient electron-selective contacts on silicon solar cells

Christophe Ballif, Mathieu Gérard Boccard, Quentin Thomas Jeangros, Monica Morales Masis, Sihua Zhong

In recent years, considerable efforts have been devoted to developing novel electron-selective materials for crystalline Si(c-Si) solar cells with the attempts to simplify the fabrication process and improve efficiency. In this study, ZnO:Al (AZO) is co-sp ...

ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV2019

Electrothermal Finite-Element Modeling for Defect Characterization in Thin-Film Silicon Solar Modules

Christophe Ballif, Michael Elias Stückelberger, Thomas Andreas Lanz

We present and validate a finite-element model for coupled charge and heat transport in monolithically interconnected thin-film solar modules. Using measured current-voltage (I-V) and lock-in thermography (LIT) measurements of amorphous silicon minimodules ...

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers2013