Your daily dose of photovoltaic technology developments and solar news

The 550MW Desert Sunlight project planned by First Solar in eastern Riverside County, California, looks to be set to go ahead now that a power purchase agreement with Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) has been signed for the remaining 300MW plant. First Solar had previously signed a 250MW supply deal with Southern California Edison for the Desert Sunlight power plant. Approval is still required from the California Public Utilities Commission, and the project is expected to start by the end of 2010 for completion in 2013.

UPDATE (3) : Financial results for First Solar in 2009 clearly place the CdTe thin-film solar producer as the number-one photovoltaics manufacturer by revenue in the world in 2009. This is the first time that the company has reached this position. Revenues topped US$2,066.2 million in 2009, up from US$1,246.3 million in 2008. Fourth-quarter revenue reached US$641.3 million, up from $480.9 million in the third quarter. Module production for the quarter reached 311MW, a new record for the company, resulting in 2009 production levels of 1.1GW, a record for the industry. Annualized capacity per line reached 53.4MW. The company also announced that it was expanding production at its Malaysian facilities and plans to add 8 new lines, with shipments starting in the first half of 2011. Conversion efficiencies of its CdTe thin-film modules reached 11.1% in the quarter and the module manufacturing cost was US$0.84 per watt.

In what the company’s CEO hailed as a major breakthrough, Singulus Technologies has received an order for its recently developed thin-film processing equipment. The order is worth €19 million and underlines attempts to broaden its product portfolio and enter new markets. Singulus said that it had been developing the technology in close cooperation with this customer during 2009.

Photovoltaics equipment supplier Roth & Rau is becoming a production partner with an unidentified China-based company to establish a joint venture firm responsible for cadmium telluride thin-film (CdTe) module production. Roth & Rau CTF Solar, a subdidiary of Roth & Rau, will be the partner in the new enterprise. The JV will use Roth & Rau’s turnkey CdTe equipment and technology and will first establish an 80MW ‘specimen’ line in Brandenburg, Germany at a cost of €100 million.

Speciality metals refiner 5N Plus has signed an MOU supply agreement with Abound Solar to supply high-purity cadmium telluride and cadmium sulphide materials for the CdTe thin film start-up’s module manufacturing operations. First Solar, the leading thin film producer, is 5N Plus’ largest customer. Abound Solar has also signed a long-term module recycling contract with 5N Plus that includes manufacturing scrap that will also be fully recycled.

A 16MW solar power plant under development by juwi solar, using 214,500 ground-mounted cadmium-telluride thin-film PV panels from First Solar, has been acquired by Duke Energy. The ‘Blue Wing Solar’ project in San Antonio, Texas, which was originally planned to begin construction in the first quarter of 2010, with completion and grid connection by the end of 2010, is unchanged. CPS Energy will be the customer, also unchanged. The Blue Wing projects will be the first commercial solar power project Duke Energy will own and operate.

S.A.G. Solarstrom has included the 4.6MWp system it installed on the roof of the Dehner garden center in Rain am Lech into its portfolio and concluded an 18-year financing transaction for €10 million with the Deutsche Bank for the associated investment volume of €14 million. The rooftop system consists of First Solar thin-film modules.

PNM, New Mexico’s largest electric utility, has signed a deal with First Solar to build 22MW (AC) of utility-scale photovoltaic solar power plants in the state. The solar company will construct the facilities using its cadmium-telluride thin-film PV panels at five separate sites within PNM’s service territory.

Debuting what it calls the first inline process control and optimization tool developed specifically for thin-film photovoltaics manufacturers, BrightView Systems has introduced its InSight M series monitoring system. Based on the company’s wide-area metrology (WAM) technology, the platform features continuous monitoring and whole-panel mapping of critical and process parameters at full production throughput and for 100% of manufactured glass and flexible panels.

First Solar has bought Edison Mission Group's pipeline of utility-scale solar power projects. Although the acquisition of some of the group’s PV plant project pipeline in California and the Southwest is a change to First Solar’s large-scale project plans, module demand from the EMG projects was included in advanced pipeline information given by First Solar in December 2009, according to the company. The financial terms of the undisclosed small utility-scale project acquisitions was also not disclosed.