Production of polysilcon continues to expand as major suppliers attempt to keep pace with market demand. Wacker Chemie has updated plans to expand its polysilicon production that includes spending €130 million on debottlenecking measures to add 10,000MT more capacity. Wacker noted that it is essentially sold out under supply contracts through 2014.
PV module encapsulants supplier, STR Holdings posted 2010 sales to the solar sector of US$259.2 million, an increase of 73.4%, compared to sales of US$149.5 million in 2009. Management noted that the increase in sales was due to increased market share gains with its current Tier 1 Chinese customers as well starting to supply a large Asian module manufacturer in the year.
Dow Corning has named Samaro, a French specialty chemical product supplier, as the distributor for its silicon-based solar product solutions in France. The French company will be a technical resource and production base for Dow Corning’s solar division while delivering Dow Corning’s solar silicon products to local customers. Samaro has acted as Dow Corning Electronics’ French distributor and will additionally undertake the delivery of Dow Corning’s Molykote brand lubricant applications in North Africa.
Bridgestone is to add a new ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA) production line to its factory in ?arów, Poland. An investment of US$58 million will be used to fund the installation, with manufacturing scheduled to begin during the first half of 2013.
China-based polysilicon producer, Daqo New Energy, has reported its first financial year results as a public company, listed on the NYSE. Polysilicon shipments for 2010 were 3,650MT, module shipments were 3.5MW, after starting volume production in the fourth quarter. Revenues in the fourth quarter of 2010 were $81.9 million, an increase of 29.6% from the third quarter of 2010. The increase was mainly due to higher average selling prices for the polysilicon.
Abengoa Solar has selected the 3M Solar Mirror Film 1100 for utilisation at one of its concentrated solar thermal projects. The turnkey system, which was installed in June 2010, has been surpassing the set specifications put in place to cut down the energy usage for a hot water storage system.
Further expanding its presence in the solar PV industry, SiC Processing has successfully closed several contract negotiations. Boosted by the recent SNEC PV Power Expo 2011, which was held in Shanghai, the company has signed off on three separate deals.
Last year saw the gases division of The Linde Group capitalise on the solar industry’s growth by securing supply contracts with over 25 new and pre-existing customers in the thin-film and crystalline silicon manufacturing sectors.
With significant ingot and wafer capacity expansions, notably underway in Asia, the demand for slurry recycling is working in tandem. With a claimed 40% market share, SiC Processing is raising €100 million via a bond issue to further expand operations in Asia and other regions.
