Fab & Facilities

Solar Frontier is not only targeting a widely reported reduction in costs around US$0.40 per watt within two years, but is also hoping to reach grid parity in Japan for residential PV systems with integrated battery storage in the next three to four years.

SolarCity is looking to hire as many new employees in just one day as it does on average every month, targeting the hire of 500 workers across 10 US states.

Major PV metallisation paste producer Heraeus Photovoltaics has said its new manufacturing plant in Taiwan would be operational at the beginning of November 2015.

Germany-based PV module manufacturer Heckert Solar said was expanding production capacity to around 300MW to improve cost competitiveness.

SolarMax branded string and central inverters are being once again in production, though not in Switzerland its former home.

Following a week in which SolarCity and then Panasonic both claimed to have achieved record efficiencies, SunPower has hit back, saying its products are “the most efficient solar panels commercially available today”.

Updated: Major renewable energy firm SunEdison experienced a silane leak that caused an explosion and fire at its granular polysilicon plant in Pasadena, Texas on Friday, October 2 injuring four workers carrying out maintenance work, according to reports.

SolarCity has claimed the highest module efficiencies with 22.04% conversion efficiencies.

Capital expenditure in the PV industry used to be a simple metric to track. A new manufacturing facility meant new capex, it was that easy.

Indian industrial firm Adani Group and China’s largest independent polysilicon to power plants group, GCL have signed an agreement to develop both upstream and downstream PV operations in India as well as collaborating on a range of energy projects such as wind and LNG terminals.