Showa Shell plans to spend 160 billion yen ($1.7 billion) over the next five years to boost its thin-film solar panel production from 80 megawatts now to 1 gigawatt, a company executive told reporters in Tokyo Tuesday (see Bloomberg story).
The oil company started in 2007 the commercial production of solar panels using copper, indium and gallium (CIS) as the key materials for converting sunlight into electricity. Showa Shell has two factories in the Miyazaki Prefecture that could produce a combined 80 megawatts of panels per year. It's looking at converting a former plasma TV factory into a third factory, which would start production in 2011.
Interesting, news about Showa Shell's plan to reach 1 gigawatt in production capacity surfaced last June. Back then, the company reportedly said it would spend 100 billion yen ($944 million) to achieve the goal.
CIS panels are cousins of panels that make use of copper, indium, gallium and selenium (CIGS). CIS panels should be easier to make and possibly cheaper, but they also aren't as efficient at turning sunlight into power as CIGS panels.
Fellow Japanese solar company Honda Soltec, for example, is making CIGS panels. Honda Soltec started selling CIGS panels for residential market in 2007 and has a factory that could produce 27.5 megawatts of panels per year, according to its website. The company started selling its products for the commercial market last October.
A number of CIGS players are startup companies in the United States, including Solyndra, Nanosolar, Miasole and HelioVolt.
Ascent Solar, which is based in Thornton, Colo., is taking a different approach from many others by using plastic instead of glass on which to deposit the CIGS semiconductors. It announced Tuesday that it would supply solar panels to two-year-old Bye Aerospace, which plans to put solar panels on unmanned aerial vehicles for the military market. The aircrafts wouldn't run solely on solar, of course. Bye Aerospace, headquartered near Denver, has just started approaching the U.S. government with its product idea.
