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MPrime, the distribution arm of Martifer Solar, has expanded its parent company’s business in Germany with the opening of new Munich offices. The company advised that working out of Germany will allow it to better serve the worldwide, and especially the German, PV sector.
Having achieved full capacity in its Czech plant, AU Optronics has turned to the US market to provide US-made solar modules and customized services, leading to the acquisition of a 9MW solar power project in the Pennsylvania School district. The company claims this will the largest solar power plant in Pennsylvania as well as one of the largest school district projects nationwide.
Falling solar panels and raw materials prices will be claiming 140 jobs at Sanyo Electric’s solar wafer factory in Carson, California, as it prepares to start up operations at a plant in Malaysia. The plant, opened in 2003, makes the equivalent of 30MW of silicon ingots and wafers for solar cells each year and is expected to close in October.
Although new conversion efficiencies have yet to be ratified by the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL), Abound Solar would seem to have caught-up with CdTe thin-film leader, First Solar. It may have an enormous task to close the gap on manufacturing metrics, but aperture area efficiencies of 12.2%, generating modules with 82.8W specification on existing production equipment is a good start. First Solar reached volume production of modules with an average efficiency of 11.7% in 2011.
PV module encapsulant material supplier, STR Holdings warned late last week that sales would not meet previously guided levels. The company had previously guided sales to be in the range of US$44-US$48 million. However STR has revised guidance to approximately US$36.5 million, well below that level.
Testing for PID (potential induced degradation) of Centrosolar’s modules at TÜV Rheinland have confirmed that its modules experienced less than 1% reduction in performance, easily passing the tests which stipulate less than a 5% voltage-related reduction in performance as being non-PID affected.
DuPont and Suntech Power Holdings announced that they had entered into a strategic agreement with an overall goal of augmenting the supply of PV materials and technologies in the global solar energy market. The companies agreement will specifically focus on technology advancements, supply chain optimization cost reduction initiatives and DuPont’s Tedlar polyvinyl fluoride film supply.
A debt-to-equity swap deal between Q-Cells and its bondholders has been agreed in principle, a situation that will result in the company’s being majority owned (95%) by the bondholders. In return, Q-Cells would be virtually debt-free and retain the €304 million of liquidity the company had at the end of 2011 to continue to restructure and continue operations. Q-Cells will also sell further non-core assets that could raise €200 million, which would be given back to the 2012, 2014 and 2015 bondholders on an equal basis.
Sunlogics Power, a subsidiary of Salamon Group, was named the senior secured creditor of Arise Technologies. The company additionally noted that it is consulting on Arise’s day-to-day operations of its systems business.
Europe’s end-of-life PV module recycling program, PV Cycle, advised of its significant growth since beginning operations in 2010. PV Cycle’s collection network has expanded to over 205 collection points, which allows the association to provide module owners in every EU27 and EFTA country with its services. Additionally, the company noted that in January, it had reached over 240 members from across the world and PV value chain, representing nearly 90% of the European solar market.
