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Hanwha SolarOne has lured Mark A. Bronez from SunPower to head-up its US operations. Bronez has been appointed as President of Hanwha SolarOne USA and will oversee general management of the US, Canadian and Mexican businesses. Bronez joins worked at SunPower, where he most recently served as Vice President and General Manager for the North America Commercial Business Unit.
Underwriters Laboratories (UL) has entered a strategic agreement with BYD, the company has announced. The official ceremony inducting the agreement was attended by BYD Chairman and president Chuanfu Wang as well as UL vice president and general manager of the company’s global energy and industrial system department, Jeff Smidt. Under the agreement, BYD New Energy Monitoring Center will become a UL certified testing center.
Profitability remains tantalizingly elusive at Suntech Power Holdings, having reported a first quarter GAAP loss of US$133 million on the back of certain one-time issues, 27% lower quarterly shipments and 10% price declines. Although management stuck to previous guidance for the year, indicating strong shipments in the second-half of the year, analysts raised concerns over Suntech’s ability to repay a US$540 million convertible note due next year.
DelSolar today announced it has completed carbon footprint verification of its high performance solar cell (D6PL) and solar module (D6P_A3A series) products. The assessment met British Standard Institution’s ‘PAS 2050:2011 Product Carbon Footprint’ specifications and the verification received the Reasonable Level of Assurance, the highest level for this certification.
A new 44MWp module assembly plant in the De Vernejoul industrial park in Porcelette, Eastern France will assemble SunPower’s Maxeon solar cells into modules to meet demand in France, Italy, Germany and Belgium. Total and SunPower said that its 3,300-square-metre plant is equipped to produce approximately 150,000 high efficiency (20% conversion efficiency) modules per year. This is the first such plant SunPower will operate in Europe, having the majority of its production in the Asia-Pacific region.
Martifer Solar revealed that its PV modules, which use Saint-Gobain Solar’s SolarBond InFrame technology, have passed the set criteria for IEC61215 acceptance, which regulates the safety performance of crystalline silicon terrestrial PV modules. SolarBond is a single component reactive compound, which applied warm fills the aluminum channel completely in order to cut down the risk of water collection in a frame’s corners.
BISOL’s polycrystalline and monocrystalline PV modules have been officially accredited by the Australian Clean Energy Council to meet with the requirements to be sold in Australia. The modules comply with the Australian Standard AS5033.
Despite the seasonally weak first quarter, Trina Solar reported module shipments of 380MW and revenue of US$349.9 million. Continued ASP declines, despite cost reductions resulted in the company reported a net loss of US$29.8 million, compared to net loss of US$65.8 million in the fourth quarter of 2011. Trina Solar guided second quarter module shipments to be in the range of 500MW to 520MW.
China Sunergy released its Q1 2012 results for which the company saw an expected net loss and shipments reaching the high end of previous guidance. Revenue for the quarter was US$68.5 million, a 38.2% drop from Q4 2011 results. The company noted that the decrease in revenue was due to a combination of falling ASP’s and shipments.
Kyocera has supplied 34MW of PV modules for a 127MW utility-scale PV plant in south western Arizona, the company has announced. The company will provide further modules, manufactured at its San Diego facility, for the project, producing through to 2013.
