Monday, June 30, 2008

Intel; GE; IBM; Nanosolar


Chipmaker Intel is the latest technology giant (after IBM and Applied Materials) to join the solar fray. It has spun-off its solar division to form an independent company called SpectraWatt that will manufacture crystalline silicon based solar cells. Neal Dikeman of CNet talks to the CEO of SpectraWatt about future prospects and the possibility vertical integration.

GE has increased its stake in PrimeStar Solar, a thin-film start-up relying on cadmium telluride technology (just like thin-film blue eyed boy, First Solar). While the use of cadmium causes some toxicity concerns, PrimteStar seeks to address these through its production policies. Separately, GE is teaming up with GAF Materials, North America's largest roofing company, to create "one-stop shopping for new roofs and solar electric systems." These are just the kind of strategic and innovative partnerships that can potentially help bring the transaction costs of installing roof-top solar systems down.

Speaking of IBM, the Big Blue continues its solar agenda by collaborating with Japanese manufacturer Tokyo Ohka Kogyo, a leading supplier of photoresists for semiconductor, flat panel display, printed wiring board and packaging, in CIGS (Copper-Indium-Gallium-Selenide)-based thin-film technologies. According to the press release, it aims to develop cells with 15% conversion efficiencies compared the to the 11 to 12% efficiencies available in the best commercially available thin-films cells today.

As if in response to IBM's announcement, NanoSolar released some truly astonishing footage of its its new "nanoparticle ink" press, a $1.65 billion 1-GW-per-year tool capable of coating 100 feet-per-minute of CIGS material that has a 14% efficiency. This is significant news for several reasons. First, most production tools in the solar indnustry have production capacities of only 10-30 MW annually. Second, solar cell efficiencies of 14% represent an improvement over what is commercially available today. Third, the company claims that 100 feet-per-minute is just a start, and that 2,000 feet-per-minute is possible! See also this piece by GreenTech Media for a the potential cost-breakthroughs that this annoucnement represents. Previously, the company also announced that it has a "fabulous" plan for serving the residential roof-top market. If all that the company claims is true, I wouldn't bet against this Google-backed startup (technically backed by Google's founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, rather than Google itself) when they IPO.

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Micro-inverters…Lots of Them

Enphase Energy spoke with the solar coaster about their groundbreaking micro-inverter system technology.

Many solar PV breakthroughs have been achieved by increasing solar conversion efficiencies of solar cells. One of the themes I have previously touched on in achieving grid parity solar power is the reduction of the balance of systems and installations costs. In Enphase Energy’s Micro-inverter system, launched yesterday, we might just be seeing a significant breakthrough in increasing solar system efficiency (which is really what matters, rather than just solar cell efficiency).

The Single Large or Several Small (SLOSS) debate is a well-known battle of ideas in the field of conservation biology. Enphase is seeking to prove that when in comes to solar power inverters, there is no debate, and that several small is the way to go.

An inverter is a necessary component of any solar system. It converts the direct current (DC) generated from a PV system into alternating current (AC) to make it compatible with the grid and usage of electrical appliances. Typically, a solar installation will rely on a single large inverter. With Enphase’s novel Micro-inverter System, each solar panel gets its own micro-inverter. Each micro-inverter is connected to a communications gateway that feeds solar power generation data to a monitoring data center that can be assessed by the solar user by the internet. Check out this cool video which take a closer look at the micro-inverters and how they are installed.

The Micro-inverters represent a remarkable technological advancement for a variety of reasons:

  1. Increased energy harvest—According to Enphase’s CEO, Paul Nahi, its 1,000 or so pilot Micro-inverter systems currently deployed have experienced a 5 to 25% increase in energy harvest over traditional single inverter systems. The reason is two-fold. First, its inverters are the first to achieve 94.5% inversion efficiency. Second, and perhaps more significantly, the phenomenon where multiple solar panels arranged in series and connected to a single large inverter perform only as well as the worst performing solar panel is avoided. Because each panel now has its one micro-inverter, a poorly-performing panel (for whatever reason such as shade or damage) will not affect the efficiency of the other panels.

  1. Increased reliability—The obvious advantage to having “several small” over “single large” is that the system is no longer vulnerable to the failure of the single large inverter. Additionally, Enphase’s Micro-inverters have a MBTF (mean time before failure) of 119 years, as compared to 15-20 years of regular large inverters. Another dimension to increased system reliability is that because each panel now has its own inverter feeding data to the monitoring center, a user is now able to, in the event of suboptimal performance, pinpoint the malfunctioning panel by acessing such data on the internet through Enphase's web-based monitoring software (see screenshot on right showing panel by panel performance data of a typical solar array) and resolve the problem more promptly.

  1. Increased ease of installation—Enphase’s Micro-inverter system radically simplifies the installation process by eliminating installation complexities (e.g. string design, marginal designs, co-planarity, and matched modules) associated with installing a high voltage inverter. There is no need to make space for a large centralized inverter and wiring time is reduced. The result, says Nahi, is that the balance-of-systems costs can be reduced by 13 to 15% by using Enphase’s systems.

All this means is that the return on investment in a solar system is greatly enhanced in multiple ways, and none of them have to do with increasing solar cell technology. According to Nahi, not only are there life cycle savings to the Enphase Micro-inverter system, but the up-front economics of the system also compare favorably to traditional single inverter systems.

Enphase has raised $6.5 million since its inception in 2006 from investors such as Third Point Management and Applied Ventures. According to Greentech Media, Enphase is selling its products and services through installers and distributors such as AEE Solar, DC Power Systems, Focused Energy, Solar Depot and SunWize.

Balance of system and installation breakthroughs are just the kind of stories I’d like to focus more on. As this excellent article on Enphase’s corporate background observes:

In the fast-growing solar industry, most of the venture capital to date has flowed into developing newer and better photovoltaic cells, while the inverter has largely been overlooked, Nahi said. "There are all kinds of new panels coming out . . . and it's thrilling to watch," he said. "But very little investment has been made in the inverter space."

Hopefully, this new technology byEnphase and the news by Xantrex that is has received $1.9 million in orders from OptiSolar are signs of change.

Tuesday, June 3, 2008

Impending pSi oversupply; Masdar big on thin-film; Reprieve in Germany

Polysilicon

Kyocera announced innovations in reducing thickness for multicrystalline silicon-based cells, leading to more efficient consumption of polysilicon, the raw ingredient that is currently experiencing a short-to-medium term supply bottleneck. Gunther Portfolio reports of a company called Schmid Silicon Technology that has developed an alternative process to the conventional Siemens process of polysilicon manufacturing called the UMOSI process, which supposedly has a cost structure that is 28% cheaper.

There are signs that the bottleneck will ease soon, however. Michigan-based Hemlock Semiconductor is ramping up production as its new facilities come on line and will double polysilicon production this year and will produce 46,000 tons by 2012. An affiliate of China-based PV manufacturer, Yingli Green Energy, is also exploring a move up the solar value chain to produce 3,000 tons of polysilicon annually. In fact, the Prometheus Institute warns that a worse-than-expected oversupply of polysilicon is impending.

Thin Film

I would think that an oversupply of polysilicon is good news for installers of silicon-based PV solar panels, and a less favorable proposition to thin-film PV producers, which have built their current competitive advantage on the fact that they use less polysilicon. However, the Prometheus Institute believes that advances in technology will help the thin-film industry continue to thrive as production grows from 1GW this year to 9 GW in 2012. One observer attributes this to the barriers to entry in an industry that is dominated by handful of large players like First Solar.

Another “big player” is the government of Abu Dhabi. More specifically, the government-owned Abu Dhabi Future Energy Co., as part of its Masdar Initiative and Masdar City plans, has contracted Applied Materials to build three SunFab Thin-Film lines with 210 MW of capacity. This $600 million contract is part of a $2 billion initiative to start a world class thin-film development company (see press release).




Big Solar

Some notable joint projects for utility-scale solar plants in the U.S. announced recently include eSolar and Southern California Edison’s plants totaling 245 MW in the Antelope Valley of Southern California; and Duke Energy and SunEdison’s PPA to build a 16 MW solar plant in Davidson County, North Carolina that will be the largest PV array in the country at the time of construction.

Policy

The entire solar industry heaved a collective sigh of relief when an agreement to reduce feed-in tariffs for solar power in Germany by up to 10% instead of 25-30% as urged by opposers of the subsidy was reached among German policymakers. On the China front, it is reported that the central government will soon release policies to stimulate domestic adoption of solar power. Currently, more than 90% of solar modules produces in China are exported.

Corporate and Industry Trends

German auto-parts manufacturing giant Bosch is to aquire 50.45% of PV-maker Ersol, valuing the company at just over EUR 1 billion. Greentech Media asks whether this is a fair price and notes that this could be a start of a trend of large engineering and manufacturing firms seeking to diversify their holdings as valuations for silicon-based PV producers decline as polysilicon goes into oversupply.

Meanwhile, South Korea seems to be ramping up its solar industry with reports like this and this.

And to end this post on a sunny note, solar optimist and futurist Ray Kurzweil predicts solar will be competitive with fossil fuel energy in five years.

Impending pSi oversupply; Masadar big on thin-film; Reprieve in Germany

Polysilicon

Kyocera announced innovations in reducing thickness for multicrystalline silicon-based cells, leading to more efficient consumption of polysilicon, the raw ingredient that is currently experiencing a short-to-medium term supply bottleneck. Gunther Portfolio reports of a company called Schmid Silicon Technology that has developed an alternative process to the conventional Siemens process of polysilicon manufacturing called the UMOSI process, which supposedly has a cost structure that is 28% cheaper.

There are signs that the bottleneck will ease soon, however. Michigan-based Hemlock Semiconductor is ramping up production as its new facilities come on line and will double polysilicon production this year and will produce 46,000 tons by 2012. An affiliate of China-based solar manufacturer, Yingli Green Energy, is also exploring a move up the solar value chain to produce 3,000 tons of polysilicon annually. In fact, the Prometheus Institute warns that a worse-than-expected oversupply of polysilicon is impending.

Thin Film

I would think that an oversupply of polysilicon is good news for installers of silicon-based PV solar panels, and a less favorable proposition to thin-film PV producers, which have built their current competitive advantage on the fact that they use less polysilicon. However, the Prometheus Institute believes that advances in technology will help the thin-film industry continue to thrive as production grows from 1GW this year to 9 GW in 2012. One observer attributes this to the barriers to entry in an industry that is dominated by handful of large players like First Solar.

Another “big player” is the government of Abu Dhabi. More specifically, the government-owned Abu Dhabi Future Energy Co., as part of its Masdar Initiative, has contracted Applied Materials to build three SunFab Thin-Film lines with 210 MW of capacity. This $600 million contract is part of a $2 billion initiative to start a world class thin-film development company (see press release).

Big Solar

Some notable joint projects for utility-scale solar plants in the U.S. announced recently include eSolar and Southern California Edison’s plants totaling 245 MW in the Antelope Valley of Southern California; and Duke Energy and SunEdison’s PPA to build a 16 MW solar plant in Davidson County, North Carolina that will be the largest PV array in the country at the time of construction.

Policy

The entire solar industry heaved a collective sigh of relief when an agreement to reduce feed-in tariffs for solar power in Germany by up to 10% instead of 25-30% as urged by opposers of the subsidy was reached among German policymakers. On the China front, it is reported that the central government will soon release policies to stimulate domestic adoption of solar power. Currently, more than 90% of solar modules produces in China are exported.

Corporate and Industry Trends

German auto-parts manufacturing giant Bosch is to aquire 50.45% of PV-maker Ersol, valuing the company at just over EUR 1 billion. Greentech Media asks whether this is a fair price and notes that this could be a start of a trend of large engineering and manufacturing firms seeking to diversify their holdings as valuations for silicon-based PV producers decline as polysilicon goes into oversupply.

Meanwhile, South Korea seems to be ramping up its solar industry with reports like this and this.

And to end this post on a sunny note, solar optimist and futurist Ray Kurzwel predicts solar will be competitive with fossil fuel energy in five years.