Viewing posts tagged "Abound Solar"

First Solar and Cadmium Hazards

The European Union is considering tightening a ban on hazardous chemicals. The ban would significantly cripple First Solar and other companies that make solar panels with cadmium as a key ingredient.

The Swedish government, which holds the EU presidency, has proposed to include all electronic products as part of an effort to update a law on hazardous chemicals. Cadmium is already considered a hazardous substance, but solar panels aren't covered under the current law.

In addition, a committee in the European Parliament is drafting a proposal that would nudge solar companies to stop using cadmium, reported the New York Times Monday. The proposal would require companies to apply for what amounts to a permit to use cadmium. The permit would last four years and could be renewed.

Tempe, Ariz.-based First Solar is one of the top 10 solar panel makers in the world and uses cadmium-telluride in its panels. Its success has helped to make cadmium-telluride panels competitive against the more widely available silicon-based solar panels.

As a result, rafts of cadmium-telluride solar companies have cropped up in recent years hoping to replicate First Solar's success. Some of these startups include Abound Solar, PrimeStar Solar and Xunlight 26.

PrimeStar has attracted investments from General Electric, which has decided to close its silicon solar panel factory in the United States and focus its solar strategy on selling thin-film solar panels like the ones under development by PrimeStar.

Europe is the largest solar market, so any move by the EU to restrict cadmium-telluride solar panel sales would cause a big problem not just for First Solar.

First Solar wants the EU to specifically exclude solar panels from being added to the revised hazards materials law. Aggressive goals by European countries to cut emissions and embrace renewable energy could help First Solar's cause.

PrimeStar Solar Preps for CdTe Panel Launch

The success of First Solar has given startup companies developing cadmium-telluride solar panels hope. Why, if First Solar could claim to be the lowest-cost producer in the industry while raking in good profits, then we could do it, too.

PrimeStar Solar is no exception. Brian Murphy, CEO of PrimeStar in Arvada, Colo., said at a recent conference that "cadmium-telluride is the only technology proven to move below $1 per watt in manufacturing cost."

The company is moving toward the launch of its commercial product, set to take place by the end of this year, Murphy said. Murphy was rather mum about his company's product specs and production plans, however.

He said the commercial factory would have a production capacity in the "tens of megawatts." PrimeStar produced its first thin-film panel in April 2007 and began pilot production last October, he added.

Murphy declined to disclose the manufacturing cost of PrimeStar. And neither would he say how well PrimeStar's solar panels could convert sunlight into electricity.

Tempe, Ariz.-based First Solar's panels could convert nearly 11 percent of sunlight into power.

PrimeStar has licensed its technology from nearby National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Back in 2007, the company was awarded $3 million from the Solar American Initiative, administered by the U.S. Department of Energy, for commercializing its technology.

Founded in 2006, the company raised $6.2 million for a first-round fundraising that year. GE Energy invested an undisclosed amount in 2007 and poured in more money to become a majority shareholder last year.

PrimeStar hopes to see its panels in power plants serving utilities or on top of large commercial buildings. They're the same markets that First Solar and other thin-film solar companies are after.

Thin-film panels on the market today aren't as efficient at generating electricity as the more prevalent crystalline silicon solar panels. So a thin-film energy system would need more solar panels to achieve the same generation capacity as the crystalline silicon variety.

PrimeStar has about 100 employees.

The company will have to contend with other startups that are developing cadmium-telluride solar panels, such as Abound Solar in Fort Collins, Colo. Abound only recently began commercial production. 

Abound Solar CEO Set to Retire

Abound Solar, a thin-film startup developing cadmium-telluride solar panels, only began commercial production a month ago, but the company's CEO Pascal Noronha now plans to retire. Or rather, he's "returning to retirement," the company said in a press release on Thursday.

Noronha plans to become the chairman of the company's board of directors by the end of this year. He'll remain as the chief executive until Abound finds his successor, the company said.

John Hill, who has been the chairman, will remain on the board.

The Fort Collins, Colo.-based company was founded by researchers from the State University of Colorado in January 2007, though Noronha began working with the founders to bring the lab-based technology to commercial production in late 2006.

It built a commercial factory in Longmont, Colo., that has an initial production capacity of 65 megawatts per year. The factory could accommodate equipment for 200 megawatts per year.

In an interview in April this year, Noronha claimed that the company would be able to produce solar panels at under $1 per watt, just as First Solar has achieved over four years. Tempe, Ariz.-based First Solar is the world's largest solar thin-film maker, and it produces cadmium-telluride solar panels as well. He said Abound worked hard from the start to develop a manufacturing process that would churn out thin-films efficiently.

"It's a completely automated manufacturing process that from the time a piece of glass starts at the beginning of the line to the time that it exits as a finished product," Noronha said at the time. "The time it takes for that piece of glass to start to the time the piece of glass exits as a PV module is 120 minutes."