Coupled spectral-hybridizable-discontinuous-Galerkin modeling of thin-film photovoltaic solar cells

An optoelectrical model has been developed to simulate thin-film photovoltaic solar cells with periodically corrugated metallic backreflectors. The rigorous coupled-wave approach (RCWA) is used to calculate the absorption across the solar spectrum. This enables the calculation of the generation rate that drives a drift-diffusion model for the electrons and holes. The drift-diffusion equations are discretized using a hybridizable-discontinuousGalerkin (HDG) scheme. The Newton-Raphson method is used to solve the resulting nonlinear system, with upwinding and homotopy used for stabilization. Numerical results concerning the convergence of HDG indicate that the HDG model is efficient and can be used to assess and improve solar cell designs.