The first PV ModuleTech event is due to take place in Kuala Lumpur on 7-8 November, and the event is poised to explain and define the key module suppliers, technologies and audited metrics that are imperative to developers, EPCs, investors and asset owners for utility-scale solar module deployment in 2018 and beyond.
When manufacturing capacities moved from megawatt to gigawatt ten years ago, the concept of having a fully-integrated and automated production site was widely accepted to be the most economical, Finlay Colville examines whether this is truly the case.
PV Tech talked with PV Lighthouse’s Malcolm Abbot ahead of PV ModuleTech 2017, being held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on 7-8 November 2017. Malcolm will be a guest speaker at the event.
‘Silicon Module Super League’ (SMSL) member GCL System Integrated Technology (GCL-SI) has secured its first order in Australia for its recently launched ‘Super 2.5 MW Solar Block’ modular plant system from Australian-based power station developer APSU Power.
Global solar PV manufacturing capacity expansion announcements in the first half of 2017 showed a significant increase over the second half of 2016. New plans almost reached the record heights set in the first half of 2016.
TUV Rheinland India, a subsidiary of the TUV Rheinland Group has opened a new €2.5 million state-of-the-art laboratory at Electronic City in Bangalore, India to provide all testing services under one roof and dramatically reduce turnaround time and accelerate time-to-market for customers.
US-based PV installer RGS Energy has struck an exclusive deal with Dow Chemical to exclusively sell its third generation (3.0) solar shingles under the ‘POWERHOUSE’ brand said to use conventional crystalline silicon solar cells rather than the original CIGS (Copper, Indium, Gallium, Selenide) thin-film substrates.
With many of the top-20 module suppliers to the solar industry now having multi-GW shipment volumes, attention has turned firmly to assessing metrics that companies can use to benchmark the quality and reliability of shipped products against their competitors.
Some of the industry is at loggerheads and many feel local manufacturing must be intrinsic to the 100GW by 2022 solar target, but the value of trade duties is under dispute.
PV Tech reached its own little milestone of having reported and analysed the R&D spending habits of the same 12 key PV module manufacturers for 10 years. The results have just been published in sister technical journal Photovoltaics International as part of the annual leaders and laggards of R&D spending for 2016.
