On Thursday, US Secretary of Energy Steven Chu addressed the House Energy and Commerce Committee about the Solyndra loan controversy. He blamed the Solyndra failure on a sharp drop in the price of solar cells.
First Solar revealed that since it began commercial production in 2002, the company had officially reached a cumulative production of 5GW, or 66 million solar modules. "This milestone helps advance our mission of providing clean solar electricity at affordable prices. Our ability to scale high-volume production has been a key factor in reducing the cost of renewable energy," said Tymen DeJong, First Solar senior vice president of global manufacturing.
After a record revenue financial year, Applied Materials is experiencing a significant reduction in equipment orders and revenue from PV manufacturing customers. Though cancellations were minimal, backlog decreased by 26% to US$2.4 billion, of which 14% is within its EES division, which includes PV equipment. Management expects PV related global CapEx to at fall by at least 50% in 2012 as manufacturers combat massive overcapacity and focus on cell efficiency improvements and technology buys.
Australian Capital Territory is launching a new incentive scheme to promote large-scale solar in the state. It is Australia’s first scheme targeting larger systems and aims to help install projects totalling up to 210MW.
Upon expiry of a recent five-year contract, long-standing employee and current CFO, Sabine Kauper will leave Phoenix Solar at the end of the year. Her replacement, Dr. Bernd Köhler comes from Siemens and will assume responsibility for finance, along with Personnel and Organisation Development, International Process and IT Management, Internal Audit and Law from January 1, 2012.
Amonix’s Seal Beach, California and North Las Vegas, Nevada facilities have earned gold-level certification for their low environmental impact from the US Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) program. The company’s buildings were rated in 13 environmental impact categories, including climate change, indoor environmental quality, resource depletion and water intake.
As Douglas May, former CEO of Unirac, retired at the end of October, the company had been in search of a new executive and they have found a new leader in Peter Lorenz. The new CEO joins Unirac after serving as president of Quanta Services’ Renewable Energy Services unit. Prior to his role with Quanta, Lorenz worked seven years with McKinsey & Company as an associate principal and specialized in finance assignments with Royal Dutch Shell from 1996 to 1999.
(Update) The CEO of solarhybrid said it is enlisting the help of First Solar to help equip a 1.5GW project pipeline it is on the verge of buying from Solar Millennium. First Solar would not confirm the existence of the supposed deal, telling PV-Tech it had no comment at this time.
Soitec and Reflexite Energy Solutions have joined forces to create a new company dedicated to producing silicone-on-glass (SOG) Fresnel lens plates for concentrated photovoltaics (CPV) modules. The company, which has been christened Reflexite Soitec Optical Technology and is to be based in Soitec’s new San Diego manufacturing facility, will also focus on increasing the efficiency and lowering the cost of the lens plates.
