Search sponsor
Search sponsor
Citing the potential destruction that a war with Iran would produce, Hans Josef Fell and Omid Nouripour have submitted a proposal to Germany’s Foreign Minister, Guido Westerwelle, urging him to support the establishment of a solar program in Iran and the elimination of the country’s nuclear energy development. The document contends that Iran has an extensive supply of fossil fuels, but, further, that it has a large potential for renewable energies.
Soventix has announced the founding of a subsidiary in Stellenbosch, South Africa. The company is dealing with the preliminary application for insolvency proceedings of Sovello and possible impacts on its business. The company is positive, though, that Sovello’s insolvency will have no impact on Soventix’ operations as the company has been independent from former minority shareholder Sovello since 2011. Soventix will bid in the next round of the South African Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Program (IPP) in August for a 75MW project that could be expanded to 300MW.
SolarEdge Technologies has announced that it has shipped an excess of 1 million of its solar power optimizing and monitoring solutions worldwide. The company ships its optimizers to over 30 different countries.
The Intersolar Awards 2012 will be presented on June 13 at Intersolar Europe in Munich. In its fifth year, entries from Intersolar China, North America and India have been invited to enter for the first time. The ceremony will be held at 4.30pm at the Intersolar Europe Innovations Exchange in hall B3, booth B3.450.
GT Advanced Technologies will supply UTECH Solar with US$8 million worth of silicon growth technology and casting furnaces, the company has announced. GT received an order from UTECH Solar for its DSS450 MonoCast silicon growth technology and another one for its DSS450HP casting furnaces. UTECH will commence the production of MonoCast wafers as well as increase production with additional DSS450HP multicrystalline casting furnaces to meet the increasing demand.
Research service company Lux Research has recently published its “Painting a Green Future: Opportunities in Sustainable Architectural Coatings” report as part of the Lux Research Sustainable Building Materials service. The report focuses on the US$53 billion architectural coatings market and the sustainability of coating technologies.
Day4 Energy has published its operating results for Q1 2012. Revenues decreased to US$6.5 million compared to UD$16 million in Q1 2011 (59%) and by US$1.8 million (22%) from Q4 2011.
Gross loss for Q1 2012 constituted US$0.7 million compared to US$2.7 million in Q1 2011 and UD$1.4 million in Q4 2011. Decreasing sales prices, as well as downwards adjustments in the market contributed to this decrease.
Conergy has published figures for Q1 2012, highlighting the first results of the restructuring process implemented in 2011.
The sales development reflects the decrease in prices in the first quarter by 40% compared to 2011. Sales in Q1 2012 were €98 million compared to €163 million in the same period in 2011. Although the German, Asian and American markets increased, shipment volumes in Europe generally decreased, resulting in a decline in shipments from 80MW to 70MW. Conergy managed to increase shipments in the American and Asian markets by 2% sales achieved were €34 million (€42 million, Q1 2011). The company was able to balance the decline in demand in Germany by taking advantage of the temporary boom in the market and receive sales of €29 million compared to €34 million in Q1 2011.
According to a report released by Bloomberg New Energy Finance, the price of polysilicon continued its downward march, dropping by 2.6% last week. The material’s average spot prices were US$23.17/kg last week, compared to US$23.78 the week before. The report further advised that the price is down around 15% this year.
DuPont has announced its Solamet PV17x photovoltaic metallization paste has become the leading frontside silver paste series on the market today due to its ability to raise efficiency by up to 0.4% in standard solar cell constructions. Solamet PV17x is also claimed to enable cell makers to use up to 15% less material, in line with the company’s intent to accelerate product developments that help the photovoltaic industry reduce its dependence on silver metals and offset some of the impact that rising silver prices have on the cost of producing solar cells and modules.
