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Competitiveness of CIGS technology in the light of recent PV developments – Part 1: The state of the art in CIGS production

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By Ilka Luck

For some years CIGS was seen as the great white hope of the PV industry, until c-Si revealed its true competitiveness in mass production. Most companies dedicated to the commercialization of CIGS, many of which were VC financed, did not survive this development. Nonetheless, the industry has recently seen new corporate entrants with impressive plans for the roll-out of CIGS. The motives for these strategic actions are of interest, so a cost-of-ownership calculation was performed for a state-of-the-art CIGS production: the result is that current production cost for a CIGS module is €0.44/Wp, with material and depreciation being the main cost drivers. Although significant progress has been made in the last few years, this is still higher than the production costs for standard c-Si modules. However, the costs for CIGS coating materials, which correspond to the wafer in a c-Si module, are significantly lower than those for a wafer. Could this be a motive for the actions that have been witnessed in the CIGS industry? The next task would be to evaluate the further costreduction potential of CIGS and the likelihood of its realization.

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Signs earlier in the year of the global industry entering a growth phase have now been confirmed beyond any doubt. Almost all the big-name suppliers have now announced some form of manufacturing capacity expansion, a trend that analysts agree will only gather pace as long as the levels of demand predicted over the next few years turn out to be correct.

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