Avancis has said that its new state-of-the-art CIS thin-film module production plant has begun ramping. Construction of the 100MW capacity facility started in June 2010 and enables the company to offer new products, boost efficiencies and lower costs, compared to its previous 20MW facility. The number of employees at Avancis is set to double from the current 250 to almost 500.
Canadian Solar has supplied 2.5MW of modules for two Siemens’s projects in southern Spain. The CS6X modules will power a carport and rooftop system at the University of Murcia.
Vertically integrated module manufacturer Hanwha is an official sponsor of the 9th annual Match Against Poverty where the world’s football elite will meet on December 13 in Hamburg in an effort to combat global poverty.
After Solar Power Portal last week reported that photovoltaic installations in the UK had begun to tail off, the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) has quietly updated its weekly data revealing shocking figures not even the most optimistic of us would have expected.
Researchers from Fraunhofer Instituts für Solare Energiesysteme (ISE), Freiburg and the Carnot-Institut Laboratoire d‘électronique des technologies de l‘information (CEA-LETI) in Paris have been awarded the Franco-German Business award for their work on developing reusable substrates for III-V multi-junction solar cells.
Bisol’s PV modules have passed a salt mist corrosion test exhibiting less that a 1% decrease in electrical performance. The newly obtained IEC 61071 certificate demonstrates that mechanical and insulation properties are retained, ensuring high energy yields for PV plants located in coastal areas or areas with higher salt mist concentrations.
Enel Green Power advised that its 5MW solar plant in Barrafranca, in the province of Enna, Italy, has been completed, bringing its total installed capacity to nearly 77MW worldwide. The Sicilian PV plant uses over 20, 000 solar panels to generate 7.2 million kWh of electricity every year.
Targray Technology International was selected by Giga Solar Materials as the global distributor for its back surface aluminum paste. The long-term agreement will see Targray distributed the solar cell aluminum paste throughout Europe, North America and India for mono- and multicrystalline silicon solar cells. The paste is said to be designed to for high efficiency, low-bowing, high material compatibility.
Roth & Rau's has recently improved the cell efficiency on their heterojunction solar cells (HJT) to 21% efficiency on 156mm wafers. Presented at the European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference and Exhibition in Hamburg at the beginning of September this year, Roth & Rau achieved the first silicon heterojunction cell on 6 inch wafers at an efficiency rating of 20%. This result was later independently confirmed at Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (ISE).
Centrosolar will be expanding its market position with its new PV system, previously only available in Germany. Nicknamed the “Roof King”, Cenpac was developed in 2010 and Centrosolar claims it is the first standard solar system available on the market that can be installed on almost any roof.
