All About Solar | Green Energy News

May 29, 2005 – Vol.10 No.10

ALL ABOUT SOLAR.

Business is sunny.

--- Solar business is business, and business is always good for the solar industry, even if solar business has little to do with building new solar capacity to power homes and businesses.

Global Solar Energy has been awarded a $1 million contract to supply flexible thin-film portable solar chargers to the U.S. Army. The chargers will be used to charge batteries and power portable electronic equipment on the battlefield.

Global Solar makes thin-film, Copper Indium Gallium diSelenide (CIGS) solar products with efficiencies up to 13.5 percent. Visit Global Solar at http://www.globalsolar.com/ .

--- Overall, the solar energy industry is expected to grow steadily for the foreseeable future, 10-30 percent per year depending on whose study you believe. To meet that growth, existing solar cell and module manufacturers will continue to increase production capacity, and new players will enter the arena.

Either way tools and equipment will be needed to manufacture solar products.

Spire Corporation, of Bedford, Massachusetts, which sells equipment needed to make solar products, has entered into a partnership with Nisshinbo Industries of Tokyo, Japan that will allow that company to manufacture and sell Spire solar module manufacturing equipment.

The new joint venture will include new research and development and a joint, world-wide marketing effort. Nisshinbo will handle the Pacific Rim nations, Spire the Western Hemisphere. Visit Spire at http://www.spirecorp.com/ .

--- Another manufacturer of solar product manufacturing lines is GT Equipment Technologies. That company is setting new records for revenue, productivity and employment

The company is already booked for the remainder of the year with $38 million in orders. Equipment shipped in March 2005 was four times that of any month during the previous year. And, the company has doubled its work force in the last 9 months to 75 - and it is still hiring. Visit GT at http://www.gtequipment.com/

--- If all homes and businesses ran on low voltage direct current (DC) instead of high-voltage alternating current (AC), solar generated electricity wouldn’t have to be converted from DC to AC. Solar installations would be less expensive and more efficient.

That isn’t the case, however. Solar has to be converted from DC to AC via inverter to power our AC toaster ovens, blenders and washing machines.

SunPower Corporation has introduced a line of inverters engineered to match the performance of SunPower’s high efficiency solar cells. The inverters have received the highest efficiency rating in their class in an independent testing program developed by the California Energy Commission.

The new inverters are available at 2000 watt/120 volt, 2900 watt/208 volt and 3300 watt/220 volt units. Visit SunPower at http://www.sunpowercorp.com/ .

--- Phase One of the world’s largest solar power plant is now up and running in Germany. The 12-megawatt Solarpark Gut Erlasse is located on a working agricultural field in Bavaria near Arnstein

Solar arrays are mounted on Solon Ag’s Mover tracking devices that tilt and rotate during the day to keep in perfect alignment with the Sun. The pedestal-mounted Mover technology was developed with multi-megawatt solar power plants in mind.

About 1/3 of the Movers used in the Solarpark use SunPower’s A300 cells. Visit Solon at http://www.solonmover.com/ and Sunpower at http://www.sunpowercorp.com/ .

--- When GE announced its Ecomagination initiative to build its investment in cleaner technology research to $1.5 billion per year by 2010, they also announced they would be launching new green products on a frequent basis.

True to their word, the company has launched a new solar electric inverter as well as new colors and new design variations for its roof-integrated solar projects.

More may have been expected from the company, but then, they’re just getting started. Visit GE at http://www.gepower.com/

--- The world’s largest solar company has increased its product line by now offering a 60-watt solar roof tile module that can be used as power-generating replacement for flat concrete roof tiles.

The new ND-60RUI tiles interlock and have integrated channels to shed water. The solar tile module can be mounted to roof battens for new and refurbished roofs.

(Editor’s note: Flat concrete tiles are often thought of as synthetic slate tiles.The use of roof battens to attach roofing materials is not that common in the U.S.)

Visit Sharp at http://www.sharpusa.com/

--- BP Solar has also been busy with business. Like Sharp the company has developed a solar roof tile known as EnergyTile (tm) that can replace flat concrete roof tiles and generate power. And, for integrated solar power with asphalt shingle roofs, the company has developed the Integra (tm) solar shingle.

The company, too, through India-based Tata BP Solar, has announced that it has won a contract to build a 30-kilowatt solar system for the Samudra Institute of Maritime Studies in Lonvala. The installation will be the largest building-integrated solar array in India. The contract will include a solar hot water system for the student’s residence.

The company has also donated 160 solar modules for a 26-kilowatt solar array to be installed on the Earth and Space Science Laboratory (ESSL) to be built in Frederick, Maryland.

The donation valued at $100,000 is clearly a good-neighbor gift to the county. Frederick was the birthplace of Solarex which is now BP Solar. The ESSL is part of the Frederick County school system. Visit BP Solar at http://www.bpsolar.com/

--- With interest perking in solar energy worldwide today, expect news to get only better as technology and products continue to improve.

The next step for solar will be for nanotechnologies to find their way into solar technologies to increase solar electric output.

Today when one photon of light hits a solar cell one electron, at best, becomes electric current. With nanocrystals, also known as nanodots, one photon of light might be converted to three electrons. The result would be solar cells that convert the sun’s rays to electricity at an efficiency rate of 65 percent, up the today’s best of 33 percent.

The nanodot-to-solar research was done by the U.S. National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). For the full story click http://www.nrel.gov/news/press/2005/1805_quantum_dot.html