On Monday, Germany's
SolarWorld , which sports a market cap
comparable to Chinese PV leader
Suntech Power (NYSE: STP), announced a large
expansion in its U.S. manufacturing capacity. After firing up
a new Oregon-based wafer and cell production site last year,
the firm is now rolling out a module manufacturing facility
at the same site. This will take SolarWorld's companywide
capacity to more than a gigawatt by 2011. While its Teutonic
competitor
Q-Cells continues to
struggle, SolarWorld is looking like a pretty solid solar
shop.
Also on Monday,
SunPower (Nasdaq: SPWRA) announced an Italian
PV power plant, to be completed later this year, as the
country's largest. The project weighs in at 24 megawatts
(MW), or nearly two and a half times the size of the plant
that Suntech hooked into the Chinese grid
last week.
Energy Conversion Devices (Nasdaq: ENER)
revealed itself as the thin-film laminates supplier for the
4.8 MW
ProLogis project that we speculated about
last week, and
Dow Chemical (NYSE: DOW) unveiled its
promising Powerhouse
solar shingle.
Dow's shingle endeavor drew support from the Department of
Energy's Technology Pathway Partnership program. Another fund
recipient was
BP (NYSE: BP), whose solar division has
achieved an 18% conversion efficiency for its cells in the
lab. This is achieved using the firm's Mono2 silicon, which
BP says offers production costs comparable to
multicrystalline substrates. If the firm can successfully
commercialize this technology, it may be able to challenge
Suntech and Q-Cells for the
module efficiency crown.
Yingli Green Energy (NYSE: YGE), like
SolarWorld, is looking to increase its footprint in the U.S.,
and has narrowed its list of choice cities down to five. The
company is reportedly only looking to invest about $20
million, though, so this is a pretty modest commitment.
Compare that to Suniva, which is investing $250 million in a
Michigan plant -- subject to a government loan guarantee, of
course.
Rounding out the week, Solarion achieved 13.4% efficiency
on a
CIGS cell, which should give
Ascent Solar (Nasdaq: ASTI) a run for its
money,
Applied Materials sold a few more of its
SunFab lines, and Energy Secretary Chu announced another
$87 million in funding for solar. Sooey!
This article was originally published as
This Week in Solaron
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