Your daily dose of Photovoltaic Technology Developments and Solar News

Next Solar, a new solar panel manufacturer based in Tripoli, Greece, has announced that it is to be use Oerlikon’s micromorph technology in the establishment of its first thin-film solar module factory. Oerlikon will deliver the turnkey production line this year, while Next Solar’s fabrication line will start production in early 2009. Read more >>

In what can only be described as frustration, Gerhard Rauter moderated a panel discussion entitled “The real needs of Fab Managers” at the recent PV Fab Managers’ Forum in Dresden, and made a general appeal to the audience to stop talking about standards for PV manufacturing and start enacting them. Read more >>

NexPower has selected BOC Lien Hwa (BOCLH), a joint venture between The Linde Group and Taiwan’s Lien Hwa Corporation, to supply the main high purity gases for its new large substrate thin film PV plant that is expected to begin operations by the second quarter of 2008. Read more >>

SCHOTT Solar has broken ground on its first phase 200,000 square foot facility in the Mesa del Sol region of Albuquerque, New Mexico that will produce photovoltaic modules and receivers for concentrated solar thermal power plants (CSP). Read more >>

With long lead-time thin film equipment such as plasma deposition, sputtering and lasers systems already ordered, XsunX has said that it is in the final stages of site selection for its thin film solar module manufacturing plant to be based in Oregon, USA. Read more >>

Calyxo GmbH, a subsidiary of Q-Cells, is to construct a new 60MWp cadmium telluride (CdTe) thin film line, which is expected to be the first of many high-volume lines. Currently, Calyxo is nearing completion of a 25MWp pilot line in Thalheim, Germany. Read more >>

SOLON AG’s recently renamed subsidiary SOLON S.p.A. has announced the establishment of a new solar module production site in Carmignano di Brenta, Padova. With an annual capacity of 120MW, the company claims that the addition of the new site will bring the company’s total yield to 150MW by the end of the year. Read more >>

Thin-film technology development is the focus for centrotherm photovoltaics AG, as the company has today announced the construction of a Research & Development Centre in Blaubeuren, Germany. Completion of the facility, which is to include a thin-film laboratory equipped with the latest analysis tools and pilot fabrication for CIGS lines, is expected in 2H08. Read more >>

Signet Solar has selected Air Products to supply turnkey installation of gas delivery systems and services and related gas needs for a new, thin-film photovoltaic (PV) module production facility located in Mochau, Germany. The new plant will be on stream in the summer of 2008 and marks Air Products' entry into the thin-film photovoltaic industry. Read more >>

According to a new research report from BCC Research Analysis, the global photovoltaics market is projected to be worth $32.3 billion by 2012, resulting in a compound average annual growth rate (CAGR) of 14.9%. Read more >>