Sustainability Report - Bank Sarasin-Alpen

Solar Energy 2005
production hall is designed for a capacity of 80 MW solar cells with an efficiency
ratio of more than 18%. At the moment Sunways has a total production capacity
of 30 MW. Last year the company only produced 11 MW. It also has a cooperation
agreement with the machinery firm Unaxis in Liechtenstein, with the aim of
jointly constructing within the next two years a production plant to make solar
cells based on thin-film technology.
Sliver Cells from Origin
Energy (AUS)
Leading Chinese producers
Baoding Yingli and
Nanjing PV-Tech
Silicon bottleneck prevents
full utilisation of production
capacities
Origin Energy is Australia’s second largest energy provider. Its recently launched
solar cell is based on sliver technology developed in association with the Australian
National University. This thin-film silicon cell is bifacial and captures light
from the rear as well, which means its production only requires approximately 3
tonnes of silicon per MW. The first 10 W of Sliver modules were produced at the
end of last year. Output is due to be increased to 40 W soon.
Apart from Suntech Power, China has a number of up-and-coming producers of
PV cells. Baoding Yingli produced cells with a capacity of 10 MW last year. The
company has an ambitious three-year plan designed to expand wafer, cell and
module capacity to 300 MW by the end of 2007. By the end of this year Nanjing
PV-Tech wants to begin operations at the first of three production lines with a
combined capacity of 100 MW. Another production hall is ready to move into
which would allow expansion up to 300 MW. But no decision has been reached
yet on when to build these production lines, and the go-ahead hinges mainly on
a secure supply of solar-grade silicon.
At the moment most big solar cell producers are expanding their production capacities.
In 2006 the top 20 companies alone would have a combined capacity of
more than 3.5 GW, equivalent to around 95% of global cell production capacity.
Past experience shows, however, that ambitious expansion plans are not always
fully implemented, or tend to be delayed. Although demand is booming, the new
capacities are still unlikely to be fully utilised because of the limited availability of
silicon. As already mentioned, the companies who are most adept and successful
at securing a supply of silicon should have fewer problems with capacity utilisation.
Solar cell technologies
Optimisation of industrial
production still a top priority
Silicon-based cell
technology continues
to dominate
Technological breakthroughs and announcements about record effectiveness
and new materials in research are almost standard fare in the development of
solar cells. But industry experts agree that the biggest challenges facing the solar
industry are not primarily in the laboratory, but in the industrial-scale application
of research findings. As far as manufacturing processes are concerned,
there is still a lot of room for improvement from a technical and commercial
viewpoint. Over the coming years the top priority is therefore still likely to be the
optimisation of manufacturing processes in order to reduce costs.
In 2004 the picture for cell technologies was pretty much unchanged. Almost
90% of all solar cells produced are now mono or polycrystalline silicon cells.
They still offer the best price/performance ratio. The enormous growth of recent
years was mainly due to these technologies (see Fig. 7). String ribbon cells, as
manufactured by Schott Solar and Evergreen Solar, may soon become more
popular because less silicon is used in their manufacture. Despite an increase in
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