General temperature dependence of solar cell performance and implications for device modelling

Abstract Solar cell performance generally decreases with increasing temperature, fundamentally owing to increased internal carrier recombination rates, caused by increased carrier concentrations. The temperature dependence of a general solar cell is investigated on the basis of internal device physics, producing general results for the temperature dependence of open‐circuit voltage and short‐circuit current, as well as recommendations for generic modelling. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.