Cu₂ZnSnS₄ as a New Solar Cell Material: The History and the Future

Cu₂ZnSnS₄ (CZTS) material has attracted much attention from industry and scientific society in recent years because of its promising applications in high efficiency and low cost solar cells. The efficiency of CZTS solar cells relies on the controllability of the phase, the composition, the defects, and the morphology of the CZTS material. This review introduces important synthetic methods that could be divided into two big groups according to their fabrication cost. Remark on advantages and disadvantages of each method follows. Emphasis is put on phase, composition, defects, and morphology control by these methods. Besides synthetic methods, cells with different configurations are summarized and compared, and promising ways to high efficiency and low cost solar cells based on CZTS nanostructure arrays is proposed. Conclusion is given to provide possible direction for future development in this field.