This looks promising.


Record Efficiency of 18.7 Percent for Flexible Solar Cells on Plastics, Swiss Researchers Report
www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/05/110519101355.htm

I think these are a little more efficient than CdTe thin film PV's - in the lab; CdTe is the $/watt cost leader. USA based First Solar is at 12% average efficiency in mass production of CdTe and still rising. But these Swiss guys could be competition for the CdTe manufuacturers if they can industrialize this polymer based PV effectively, but CdTe isn't standing still either.

Too bad MDDorogi isn't here to comment.

I'm still around

No doubt, CIGS is moving along well. The conventional wisdom (probably correct) is that CIGS is better in the lab, but harder to make in volume production. However, lots more effort is going into solar cells in general, and CIGS in particular due to these potential advantages, so it will not be surprising if someone works out the details and becomes the cost leader, supplanting CdTe.

Of course First Solar has a CIGS program. GE has decided to go into CdTe, perhaps an endorsement of the technology. We like to think GE knows what they are doing.

The record CdTe cell is still 16.5% from many years ago. It has proven difficult to move that up, although production efficiencies (which is what really counts) have improved and will continue to do so, I think.

IMHO, First Solar cannot average 12% in production. Their premier module, at 85W, is 11.7% (using the total module area of 0.72 m2). I'm not sure where their average is, but I would think it's around 11%, 80W. This is still really good, of course.

Oh, didn't realize you are the Root.

This is what the First Solar CEO said in the quarterly conference call.



and his forward looking statement....

Yeah, so their premier module is 11.7%. Their average will be less than that, but who knows what the mix is of what they make. I don't know if they've converted all of their production over to series 3 (kind of doubt it, but maybe), which is wired differently to produce lower voltage and higher current, reducing BOS costs. Anyway, chances are the bulk of their production is around 80W, since they sell 75W to 85W series 3 modules.

Who knows, maybe they do better than I think, with most of their production being in the 80-85W range. Word on the street is probably quite unreliable, just like conference call statements are needing clarification as to the details. But, surely they break 12% on many modules.

Rootwitch wrote:


My take on that conversion efficiency has been an average, they have reported a number every quarter since I have followed them anyway - a couple years now, but I could be wrong as like you said they don't reveal enough to satisfy a skeptical mind. As for panel power output, in 2010 their average was 76W per panel according to their 10K; they sold almost 1.4 gigawatts.

For my FSLR financial model I used the least optimistic numbers in their projections and add a few years to their timing to boot. I have been in and out of the stock about a half dozen times, buy low and sell high - I am out now. I have another limit order in at $119 - I might get a hit during the summer malaise. The Republicans are a threat, always trying to derail alternative energy, but they are just bumps in the road to the future so I don't react to stock price perturbations based on their shenanigans; most sales are outside the USA anyway. They expect $4 Billion in sales over the next 12 months!

solar cells hit 70% efficiency
.
.
.
.
.
.



since the 1970s

why is no one using solar heat collectors? it takes more energy to heat water up than to run a light bulb.im still waiting for the new plastics that are supposed to be better than glass.are they withholding technology? or is glass the final frontier? they have thin film cheap solar but i dont see it for sale anywhere.why does solar only rely on a thin band of frequency?ten years ago we didnt have white or blue leds.now there everywhere.what the hell are these people doing?

Well, they are! I have them. Installed a bunch of systems too.

Solar themal remains more niche market than mass market. Heat is a lower grade of energy than electricity, and therefore less valuable. You can transport electricity all over the place, but you can't do that easily with heat.

Solar doesn't rely on a thin band of energy, necessarily; it depends on the bandgaps of the absorbers used. Efficiency is limited by the laws of thermodynamics.

great! what kind of glazing are you using? are there any cheap plastics that hold up? is copper still the best way to go. i plan on building my own panels but i cant find out much new info on them. it seems there still building them like they did 30 years ago.what is the best system for south western pa -20 deg winter temps.i have large south facing roof but a limited budget.

Root,

I went back and tweaked my model and changed my limit order to $109. This is how I see it.

First Solar's, and all CdTe guys, big challenge is Balance of System Cost due to the low conversion efficiency. FSLR plays these costs close to the vest so it's an art trying to estimate their BOS cost - where they sell complete systems. My guess for their costs this year are 73 cents/watt for the module and $2.15 for the BOS or a little under $3/watt total. And they are selling these complete systems for about $3.80/watt.

Their average gross margin will be around 41%, but they are selling the BOS at cost so their margin is high only because module margins are high and BOS sales are only about 12% of their unit watt sales.

To maintain market share, as penetration becomes significant, gov't subsidies decline and competition heats up, they will have to sell more modules in complete systems to keep their market price competitive; this subsidizing of BOS price to drive module sales will eat into their margins. So while they may very well achieve 50 cent/watt module costs in the next several years, getting BOS costs down to under a dollar seems unlikely to me and that is what they would need to do to achieve a sale price of $2/watt which is what they would need to do to achieve grid parity - with the current subsidy.

Not being in the industry, does that seem realistic with 50 cent modules and let's say 14% conversion efficiency?

Yes, IMO. As far as cost/watt, there are two big knobs: the efficiency, and the deposition rate. FSLR is depositing CdTe at around 20-30,000 angstroms per second. In itself, this is an amazing achievement given the typical rates for various thin-film deposition technologies (where a few hundred angstroms/sec is high). Largely, this breakthrough put them on the map.

But it can be higher, and so, companies are working on coating larger pieces of glass using even higher deposition rates. Additionally, there is work going on in trying to achieve the same efficiency with a thinner CdTe layer - which again would increase production quantities significantly.

Some of these changes would require additional CAPEX but only incrementally, as far as I know. And they should reduce BOS costs, but for me, it would be guesswork to say anything about that.