By Kari Williamson

The first product is a single step, jettable material that performs as both an etchant and dopant for solar PV. The material is used as a precursor to screen printing of contacts.

The removal of the anti-reflective top layer allows for maximum contact between silver contacts and silicon, Trident says. It then works as an n-dopant as it penetrates the silicon emitter directly below the contacts.

The combination of etchant and dopant can create up to a 0.5% increase in solar PV cell efficiency, the company adds.

In addition, Trident is introducing an industrial inkjet printhead, featuring a lifetime of one year, which Trident says is up to 12x longer than alternative inkjet printheads, while also providing precision performance as contact line widths can be as narrow as 50 microns.

The industrial inkjet printhead is specially designed for optimum performance in non-contact printing of a wide variety of acid and alkaline etchants and conductive materials for direct write, printable solar PV production processes.

Trident is also presenting new inkjet etchant deposition performance data relating to etchant line widths, production speeds and contact resistance performance at EU PVSEC.