Sandvika, Norway-based REC ASA has published its second-quarter financials for 2011, which show revenues of NOK 3,391 million, down 17% on the previous quarter. Significant weakening of the solar market led to a slowdown in demand for the company’s products, while polysilicon production operations are also under pressure from Chinese competitors.
Hemlock Semiconductor’s new polysilicon plant, currently under construction in Clarksville, Tennessee, USA has signed a multi-year contract with Praxair, which will supply hydrogen to the facility. Praxair said it would build and operate an on-site hydrogen generating facility and supply liquid hydrogen by truck. The plant start-up is scheduled for 2012, according to Praxair. Praxair also supplies nitrogen and hydrogen to Hemlock’s polysilicon facility in Hemlock, Michigan.
Just days after announcing the completion of its third research and development center in Singapore, the PV business unit of Heraeus advised that it has tripled the size of its global technical staff so that it can more easily meet the demand for its products and customer timeframes. The Singapore facility joins the company’s US and Germany R&D sites, as well as Heraeus’ Shanghai and Taoyuan application centers.
GT Solar advised that it had received orders from two new customers based in Asia for the company’s polysilicon production equipment. Together the two customers’, who remain anonymous, orders amounted to US$81.7 million and called for GT Solar’s hydrochlorination equipment for TCS production and other polysilicon production equipment. The orders will be included in the company’s backlog for its first quarter of the 2012 fiscal year, which ended July 2.
The photovoltaics division of Heraeus Materials Technology has completed construction on its new Singapore facility, which will produce the company’s silver metallization paste for use in crystalline solar cells. The site will also house the unit’s R&D, sales and technical service operations, all of which began operation in June. The R&D lab was the facility’s most recent completion, having been finalized in July. It plans to have qualification samples ready for customers in the coming weeks. The site’s official opening ceremony will be held in November.
A 2006 long-term wafer supply deal between Suntech and MEMC has been ‘mutually terminated' at a cost to Suntech of approximately US$212 million. Suntech said that the decision to cancel the wafer supply deal was due to ‘rapid changes in the market for silicon wafers.’ Suntech also announced that it was stopping investment in CSG Solar's research and development operations, which focused on crystalline silicon thin-film technology. MEMC remains a wafer supplier to Suntech under other supply agreements.
SunSi Energies advised that it has continued moving forward with plans to raise capital in order to fund future company expansions and acquisitions. The past three months have seen the company gather around US$5 million through cash received from equity sales of US$635,000, common stock subscription commitments of US$1,750,000 and the conversion of US$2.7 million in redeemable stock to common equity by its 40% equity partner, Wendeng facility.
In the fifth award announcement regarding a solar project or company this week, the US Department of Energy said it has offered a conditional loan guarantee commitment of $150 million to 1366 Technologies to help the Lexington, MA-based silicon PV innovator to scale and expand manufacturing of its DirectWafer technology. The company plans to use the funds to bring its first plant, a 20MW facility in Massachusetts, online in 2013, and then to begin construction on a second 1GW plant that same year in an as-yet undetermined US location.
In reporting first quarter financial results, metals specialist Timminco, noted that it had rebranded its solar grade silicon operations as ‘Timminco Solar’ and was executing a strategic marketing effort to communicate to PV manufacturers its ‘value proposition’ for the product. Timminco management said that the firm had shipped 135MT of solar grade silicon from inventory in the first four months of the year with 63MT alone shipped in April, 2011.
Several large sapphire furnace orders have helped GT Solar to almost double its equipment order backlog guidance from approximately US$1 billion to US$1.6 billion. However, technical upgrades offered to existing customers of DSS650 furnaces are tracking ahead of schedule, enabling GT Solar to raise revenue guidance for the current quarter to approximately, US$225 million, up from previous guidance of between US$140 million - US$150 million.
