REC is collaborating with Silicon Genesis Corporation (SiGen) on its thin-PV substrates made using its ‘kerf-free’ wafering process. REC is also collaborating with SiGen to develop high-volume manufacturing equipment and develop silicon ingot shaping requirements. The SiGen technology doesn’t require wafer sawing with wafers produced being within 150um to 50um in thickness and less brittle than conventional solar wafer.
Green Energy Technology Inc. (GET) has signed a five-year service contract with Applied Materials to support GET’s ‘SunFab’ production line, located in Taiwan. Get also produces multi-crystalline silicon wafers.
Collaboration between Manz Automation AG and Basler AG has led to Manz claiming that it has developed the fastest cell testers for crystalline silicon solar cells at more than 2,400 solar cells per hour. In an exclusive deal Manz has integrated Basler’s electroluminescence measurement technology into its testing platform, which is fully automated.
ChengDu Tianwei New Energy PV Module Co. Ltd. (Tianwei) has selected stringing and tabbing systems from Spire as well as multiple ‘Spi-Assembler’ 6000 systems to fully automate the soldering of individual solar cells into strings ready for busing. Tianwei is automating these production steps as part of its plans to increase capacity of its solar cell products.
Gilad Almogy, Ph.D., has been promoted to Senior Vice President and General Manager of the Display and Thin Film Solar Products Business Group at Applied Materials. Dr. Almogy was named general manager of Applied's Display and Thin Film Solar Products Business Group in August 2007. Previously, he was general manager of Applied's Process Diagnostics and Control (PDC) business group based in Israel.
Neo Solar Power (NSP) has said that its thin-film task force, which is led by Dr. Sam Hong, President of NSP, expects to commence production of its first thin-film production line in the second half of 2009. The company is targeting between 30 and 60MW initial capacity.
Trina Solar has placed a multi-year, multi-system contract for Spire’s ‘Spi-Sun’ Simulator 4600 Single Long Pulse (4600 SLP) systems. The 4600 SLP has recently been purchased by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and Underwriters Laboratories.
Day4 Energy, Inc. has said that its Generation II solar cell technology and processes have reached a new performance milestone with conversion efficiencies reaching 19 percent on mono-crystalline and 18 percent on multi-crystalline silicon materials in its R&D lab. Importantly, the company claims that when the Gen II technology is put into production over the next 18 months, production costs will have been reduced by up to 25 percent compared to conventional production costs.
Pevafersa Group has selected Praxair to supply its new 120MW solar cell manufacturing facility in Toro, Spain with on-site gases, gas equipment and gas management services. Initial production is set for early September, 2008.
With the photovoltaic industry growing at a compound annual growth rate of 40 percent through 2010, iSuppli Corp. is projecting that the global production of PV cells will reach 12GW by 2010, up from 3.5GW in 2007. To reach that figure, as many as 400 production lines with at least 1MW of PV cell production per year will be established, a four-fold increase from about 90 to 100 production lines in existence at the end of 2007, iSuppli said. Importantly, iSuppli sees the number of 1GW scale fabs to grow as part of the photovoltaic industry’s cost reduction strategies.
