Editors' Blog Materials

Our live curation of latest news and developments charts how the pandemic is disrupting supply chains and the day-to-day business reality of solar operators worldwide.

The solar boom being fostered by UAE, Saudi Arabia and others is fuelling the appetite for imported PV components. Top Chinese makers walk PV Tech's Carrie Xiao through their steps to succeed in a region of megaprojects.

PV Tech is to hold the first ever conference, dedicated specifically to heterojunction (HJT) solar cell technology in manufacturing. The event will occur over two days, on 11-12 June 2020, in St. Petersburg in Russia.

The new Q1 2020 bankability analysis has now been completed by the PV-Tech market research team, ranking PV module suppliers within the PV ModuleTech Bankability Ratings. The listing reveals that LONGi Solar now commands AAA-Rated status, the highest grade achievable. A further seven module suppliers are in the AA and A bands and four suppliers fall into the B levels.

With the spin-off of most of its solar cell and PV module manufacturing operations to new entity Maxeon Solar Technologies (MXT) expected in Q2 2019, SunPower shed new light on the planned capacity expansions of the new offspring in its fourth quarter earnings call.

The first steps have been taken in ending the trade war between the US and China now that the ‘Phase 1 Trade Agreement’ has been signed. A surprise inclusion for the PV and semiconductor industries has been China’s agreement to reopen the trade doors for US-made solar-grade polysilicon.

PV Tech’s Carrie Xiao speaks to backsheet manufacturer Cybrid about the company’s use of new innovations to tackle some of the key issues affecting bifacial modules.

During the past few years, the migration from multi to mono, replacing Al-BSF p-type cells with rear passivation layers (PERC), and having the capability of bifacial light absorption, have been the very obvious technology shifts seen within the PV industry.

Capital expenditure (capex) for c-Si manufacturing (covering ingot/wafer and cell/module stages) is forecast at approx. US$9 billion in 2019, consistent with levels seen during 2017 and 2018.

The forthcoming PV CellTech 2020 event in Penang, Malaysia on 10-11 March 2020 is to feature a special session topic on thin-film solar PV, and review the prospects of this technology being the subject of another round of global investments.

Aiko Solar has been celebrating its 10th anniversary in 2019 and has become the largest merchant solar cell producer in the last few years, focusing on high-efficiency cells, notably mono-PERC (Passivated Emitter Rear Cell] production, and is the first-tier producer of this cell type in 2018.

The fifth PV CellTech event takes place in Penang, Malaysia on 10-11 March 2020, and will be happening at a time when PV is going through its most dramatic realignment yet, in terms of manufacturers dominating the cell supply landscape, and the technologies being deployed in mega mass-production.

How PV module supply has now become a marketing and trade-show related game of numbers; what is driving this, and why is it perhaps causing more concern to the very grouping it is meant to impress – the end-user.

The third PV ModuleTech conference takes place in Penang, Malaysia on 22-23 October 2019. One of the key companies participating in the PV ModuleTech event this year is PV Evolution Labs (PVEL). PVEL provides extended reliability and performance tests to evaluate PV modules for the downstream market and produces the annual PV Module Reliability Scorecard.

During the recent series of articles on PV-Tech - outlining the drivers, methodology and validation of the new PV ModuleTech Bankability ratings for PV module suppliers - one of the key inputs required to generate the overall supplier bankability score (and rating class) was the financial strength of each company.