A new partnership has been formed that will offer self-aligned cell technology from 1366 Technologies via RENA's wet processing technology. 1366's proprietary honeycomb-structured texture to the cell production process is claimed to boost cell efficiency. The texture can be used on both mono-crystalline and multi-crystalline wafers.
Flextronics has dedicated 1 million square feet to create a "Clean Tech Super Site" at its established facility in Port of Tanjung Pelepas, Malaysia. The electronic manufacturing services company already has a range of solar photovoltaics module production capabilities operational at the PTP location, with development plans to increase its site capacity to support 1GW of module production over the next two years.
Premier Power Renewable Energy said that its Spanish solar project development and construction operations have reached record contract backlog in its first quarter of 2010, with more than 3MW of residential and commercial photovoltaic rooftop contracts secured.
Solar Power, Inc. has embarked on a new solar system installation project that will see the company set up eight PV systems at seven schools and a district office in Baldwin Park, California. The Baldwin Park Unified School District (BPUSD) has commissioned the project, which will total 2.24MW on completion, with the aim of saving an estimated $22.6 million in electricity costs.
GCL-Poly has announced 2009 financial results and detailed a major effort to diversify operations and move downstream into wafer and solar project development. Revenue from the sale of polysilicon and wafers amounted to RMB 2,537.1 million (US$371.6 million) and and RMB 262.3 million (US$38.4 million respectively. GCL-Poly was able to produce 7,454MT of polysilicon in 2009 and sold 5,675MT as well as 46.4MW of wafers via tolling arrangements. Average selling price for polysilicon was US$65.4 per kg and US$0.83/W for wafers. As the company ramped polysilicon production and benefited from improved economies of scale, production costs declined significantly from US$66.0 per kg in 2008 to US$39.4 per kg in 2009.
SolFocus is installing a 1MW high-concentrator photovoltaics system at Victor Valley College in the high desert of California. Construction of the HCPV installation, which consists of 122 of the company's SF-1100S 8.4KW arrays spread across six acres, is taking place on the college's main campus in Victorville, CA. When the power plant is completed in May, it will generate about 2.5 million kilowatt-hours annually (roughly 30% of the college's electricity demand) and be the largest facility of its kind in North America, according to SolFocus.
Lower house politicians in the Czech Republic have now approved a law to cut the incentives for solar energy production in a bid to control the expected rise in solar installations. The Czech Republic's Prime Minister, Jan Fischer, first called for the cuts earlier this month.
Struggling PV module start-up Day4 Energy saw fourth-quarter revenue reach CDN$36.6 million, an increase of 175% from the prior quarter and 120% increase over the same period in 2008. Full-year revenues for 2009 were CDN$60.0 million, compared to CDN$76.8 million for the prior year. The company was forced to reduce its workforce in early 2009 and shift module production to Jabil in Poland.
Inergia and 9REN have signed contracts for the turnkey construction of two ground-based photovoltaic systems in Puglia, Italy. One of the systems will be a fixed structure, while the other will be mobile.
Filmetrics has opened two film thickness measurement application labs in Tainan, Taiwan and Munich, Germany. Each lab is tied into the Filmetrics support network, which provides immediate internet and voice response to Filmetrics customers.
