Editorial to the Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Crystalline Silicon Photovoltaics (SiliconPV 2016)

Abstract

Crystalline silicon photovoltaics is dominating the photovoltaic industry and this trend should last for the foreseeable future. On the other hand, photovoltaics is about to become a major energy source due to its cost effectiveness and fast deployment all over the world. Silicon has obviously many assets such as abundancy, it is a well-known material from other industries (microelectronics) and it is non-toxic. A large ecosystem around crystalline technologies is now in place which helps to support the huge R&D efforts that should be pursued to improve efficiencies and reduce costs. Thus, the dynamics in this field of research is becoming more and more important, and has to address the whole value chain, from silicon wafer, solar cell and module production as well as for fundamental issues allowing for a better understanding of the underlying physics. The 6th edition of the SiliconPV conference took place in Chambery, France, from March 7 to 9 and was hosted by CEA-INES. The focus was on the science and technology of advanced crystalline silicon solar wafers, cells and modules and the fundamental properties of the crystalline Si substrate as well as its influence on the device behavior. The 2016 edition of SiliconPV was again combined with the nPV workshop, in which the progress on n-type silicon is presented and which includes an additional day focusing on industrial presentations. The conference was attended by 320 people from the global Si-PV community and led to intense interaction between R&D-groups of academic and industrial origin. This issue contains 18 manuscripts selected and peer reviewed by the scientific committee of SiliconPV 2016.