Your daily dose of photovoltaic technology developments and solar news

Product Briefing Outline: To help customers show objective evidence that they are in compliance with test specifications during ISO 17025 quality audits, Atlas now offers the ‘Atlas LS-200’ Full Spectrum Monitoring device. The LS-200 has been specifically designed for use in Ci Series ‘Weather-Ometers’ to precisely measure the SPD output of the xenon lamp. Validation tests have shown that this device has excellent correlation to the spectroradiometers used in the Atlas Calibration Laboratory.

Product Briefing Outline: Schreiner ProTech has designed a rugged, self-adhesive Pressure Compensation Seal (PCS), especially designed to provide solar module junction boxes with long-lasting protection against severe environmental conditions, preventing damage to sensitive electrical components. The product has already been selected by KOSTAL Industrie Elektrik to be integrated into their PV modules' junction boxes.

Product Briefing Outline: Mitsubishi Plastics has launched the high gas barrier photovoltaic (PV) backsheet ‘Back-Barrier’ to the global market. The new backsheet material is Mitsubishi Plastics' latest development in high gas barrier films with the world’s highest level of water vapor barrier, according to the company and customer evaluation tests.

Product Briefing Outline: mbj-Solutions have introduced an offline solar module inspection system designed for the use in the factory and laboratory. The ‘SolarModule EL-basic’ is an advanced offline electroluminescence inspection system. Different module sizes, laminated and not laminated can be inspected without any extensive adjustment work. The design of the system combines usability, high resolution, short tact time and fast return on investment in one machine.

Product Briefing Outline: KUKA Systems has partnered with tesa SE to develop a new tape head module, ROBO TAPE R, which is used in the final automated application of adhesive tape to solar modules.

Product Briefing Outline: The Schmid Group has launched a new Tabber Stringer created in cooperation with the Wolf company. The system is designed to offer high precision performance combined with minimum handling and a soldering method that is claimed to reduce the risk of cell damage during processing and handling.

Product Briefing Outline: Kaneka has introduced a newly developed ‘Hybrid’ PV module to the US market. The Hybrid PV module uses tandem junction cells, employing a microcrystalline thin-film silicon layer and the thin-film amorphous silicon layer. The new module is said to achieve a maximum 42% higher energy conversion efficiency than Kaneka's conventional thin-film amorphous silicon PV module. The nominal power of the Hybrid PV module is 110Wp.

Product Briefing Outline: Saflex, a unit of Solutia, has launched a new thin gauge polyvinyl butyral (PVB) based encapsulant designed specifically for photovoltaic applications. The new product, Saflex PA41, is claimed to significantly reduce encapsulant usage by 33%, while maintaining module durability and processing performance. The global launch of Saflex PA41 comes shortly after successful completion of IEC 61646 certification, with testing on thin-film modules. Saflex also partnered with module manufacturers to confirm that handling, processing, and throughput of Saflex PA41 met or exceeded expectations compared to thicker gauge PVB encapsulations.

Product Briefing Outline: ACC Silicones, the European manufacturer of specialist silicone elastomers, launches its new PV range of products. These adhesives and encapsulants are compatible with most materials commonly used in the assembly of PV modules and concentrator (CPV) cells.

Unlike news stories, which generally have a short lifespan, but higher visitor levels, new product reviews can often prove popular for several months or more. Excluding the PV-Tech homepage, the Product Briefings section is the fourth most visited section of the site in 2009.  In collating the Top 10 new product reviews of 2009, many product reviews in particular stood out for having an extremely long shelf-life that with some started in 2008, yet continued to attract readers throughout the year.