September 2011 - I-Micronews

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S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 1 I S S U E N ° 1 3 INDUSTRY REVIEW SolFocus HCPV module (Courtesy of SolFocus) The HCPV sector starts to talk in megawatts Makers of concentrating photovoltaic systems are at last installing systems measured in megawatts, and even getting a few utility power purchase agreements for future 100+MW systems. “A year ago at Intersolar people asked how CPV worked, this year they asked how much they could get and when,” says Vahan Garboushian, CTO of Amonix. 4 But the real sign that the HCPV niche may be becoming a significant solar alternative is the 100MW-scale capacity HCPV module manufacturing the industry leaders plan this year. SolFocus plans to double capacity to 100MW by the end of the year. Amonix executives have said they plan to ramp to 100MW capacity by the end of the year. Though Soitec has yet to finalize the specifics for its planned new San Diego plant, local papers have reported a target of 200MW capacity, and production facilities to support the 300MW in power purchase agreements from San Diego Gas & Electric will need to be multiple times larger than the current ~30MWcapacity Soitec production facility in Germany. These planned volume plants will help move the niche HCPV sector towards becoming a more mature manufacturing business, with significant potential now to reduce costs by automated production, a supporting supply chain infrastructure, outsourcing or production partnerships with established volume assembly companies, and moving away from all custom components and production equipment. Local interest in clean tech jobs from HCPV is also boosting the sector, as this newer technology on the verge of ramping mass production currently looks like a better prospect for local development now that the flat plate solar manufacturing business is increasingly a big company game dominated by low-cost regions of the world. Soitec’s planned HCPV plant in the San Diego area was apparently a key sweetener for the PPA deals with San Diego Gas & Electric. The US government supported Amonix’s new $18M plant in Nevada with almost $6M in subsidies, then also guaranteed a $90M loan for its 30MW Alamosa, Colorado, project. The Chinese province of Gansu’s deal for 20MW of ZenithSolar HCPV projects also requires local manufacturing. And several of the installations at educational institutions are related to solar job training programs. P V M a n u f a c t u r i n g
I S S U E N ° 1 3 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 1 Amonix aims to put 40MW-50MW of HCPV in the ground this year “We’ll put 40MW to 50MW in the ground this year,” says Amonix founder, CTO and Chairman Vahan Garboushian, who argues that the sector is finally turning the corner towards becoming a volume business. Work is underway on the 30MW installation in Alamosa, Colorado. Construction is also finishing up at the 5MW installation in Hatch, New Mexico, where tracker posts were in and frames on site back in the last available public photos of the site back in March. Amonix was hiring field engineers for commissioning and running both these sites earlier this summer. The company also dedicated a 2MW project in Tucson in April. Garboushian says customers are now looking for HCPV demonstration projects in the MW range, as the focus has moved from demonstrating the technology to demonstrating how the technology performs at a particular location. And he notes Amonix’ recently announced joint venture in India targeting large distributed generation projects in an area without the highest DNI, where HCPV still looks competitive with flat plate PV costs. “A year ago at Intersolar people asked how CPV worked, this year they asked how much they could get and when,” says Garboushian. “They’re not asking if the technology is viable anymore.” The maturing of the technology also means that the key factor for success moves from innovation to execution. “Now what it will require is muscle, manufacturing, and money,” Garboushian argues. Amonix’s uses solar grade PMMA treated with UV retardants for its Fresnel lenses, putting multiple cells on one receiver plate per Fresnel lens parquet, and using a secondary reflective optic of highly polished aluminum. “We’ve experimented with different materials including glass for many years, but we’ve been using this same material in the field since 1994 and it still looks robust,” he says, noting the acrylic’s better transmissivity and better manufacturing tolerance. Company data tests showing 0.3%-0.4% degradation per year suggest the modules would maintain over 90% of their original efficiency for 25 years if this rate of change remained constant. Amonix Amonix HCPV systems (Courtesy of Amonix) originally produced everything except the lenses in house, but as production increased it outsourced its designs to others. Though it can do cell finishing in house, it buys most of its cells from Spectrolab and Emcore and assembles them in the receiver package and on the receiver plate, then assembles and aligns all the components into its megamodule. Compared to the more established flat plate PV technology, HCPV likely has much more headroom for improving efficiency and cost, though the smaller sector has much less total money and manpower than flat plate PV to Annual manufacturing capacity of some HCPV companies (Yole Développement, <strong>2011</strong>, HCPV report) 300 250 200 MW/yr 150 100 50 0 Amonix Renovalia Energy Green Guascor Emcore and Gold Isofoton MagPower Soitec Sol3G SolFocus Suntrix Foton Energy As of <strong>2011</strong> Planned 100 11 10 50 15 10 12 30 12 50 10 100 NA NA NA NA NA 50 280 NA 100 NA P V M a n u f a c t u r i n g 5
Page 1 and 2: PV Manufacturing SEPTEMBER 2011 ISS
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