Industry Updates

On June 28, 2021, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued a final written decision on an inter partes review (IPR) proceeding, declaring all of the patent claims in Hanwha Q-Cells’ U.S. Patent 8,933,525B2 to be invalid.

JinkoSolar has announced that the first shipment of 1MW (out of 2.6MW) of high-efficiency PV modules has been delivered for SGCC’s first off-grid PV pilot project in Ethiopia, the first in the whole East African region. Being a part of the World Bank's "Lighting Africa" program, it has important strategic significance, as it is the opening project of the entire program and plays a demonstration role for other participants, showing how to provide solutions for better electricity services in Africa.

LONGi has announced that, as a result of its partnership with leading Thai project developers such as Gulf and Green Yellow, it has delivered over 250MW of its modules to Thailand in the first 6 months of 2021. Based on industry figures, the company now has a market share of over 31% in the country.

LONGi has supplied 1,224kWp of high-efficiency modules to the Crystal International Group in Hanoi. The project was executed by Solar Electric Vietnam, a leading EPC with extensive commercial and industrial PV experience.

Singapore is now home to one of the world's largest offshore floating photovoltaic farms, a 5 MW-peak project deployed in the Straits of Johor.

As a product operating for 25 or even 30 years, generating electricity continuously is essential for a PV module to maximize value for customers. Therefore, the module should be designed in consideration of its ability to resist extreme climatic conditions throughout its full life cycle. To verify the ability of a module to resist external mechanical stress, LONGi and TÜV NORD jointly carried out a wind tunnel test to measure its ability under a dynamic load, with LONGi also carrying out a static load test on a large-size module (LONGi Hi-MO 5, 2.26×1.13m) and an oversized module (2.38×1.30m), to simulate bearing capability under an outdoor snow load. The test results showed that the rigidity of both the monofacial and bifacial Hi-MO 5 is better than that of the oversized module and can pass the thresher test at a wind speed of 60 m/s. The static load test showed that the deformation of both the monofacial and bifacial Hi-MO 5 module was less than 45 mm, and their anti-crack abilities were excellent.

Jolywood held its fifth extraordinary shareholders meeting at the end of June. Several significant agenda items were passed, including the review and approval of the issuance of A-shares for specific objectives, the signature by wholly-owned subsidiaries of a loan agreement guaranteed by Jolywood, and the signing off of an investment agreement for a 16GW annual output high-efficiency monocrystalline cell smart factory project.

With a total installed capacity of 100MW, a solar power plant located in China’s Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region was connected to the grid at the end of June, 30MW of the capacity utilizing Antaisolar’s Helios D2 solar trackers.

A new 250kW offshore smart energy storage project has been completed on an island in Thailand’s Andaman Sea. It involves 250kW of PV panels, a KSTAR GSE 250T bi-directional converter and 1MWh OPZV battery, working together with a wind turbine and diesel generator combination to provide clean and reliable electricity to the homes of 300 local fishermen.

The 58th edition of the ‘Solar cell efficiency tables’ has been released, including reference to the world records set by LONGi’s N-type TOPCon and HJT technology in early June.