New Low Cost Solar Panels Ready for Mass Production

Excellent. I subscribe to the listserve for Nanosolar (another thin-film company, but a different process), and their latest email (coincidentally today) suggested wholesale prices in that same range (wholesale $1/watt). The only thing they don't say is when the @)#$* panels will actually be available for sale. But I'm glad to see somebody else turning up the heat. At $2/watt retail, that changes the whole ballgame.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Boulder Bum @ Sep 24 2007, 03:18 PM) [snapback]517036[/snapback]</div>

This is big! $1/watt is the holy grail of solar power makers, and that's a big plant for just starting out, although the article has a definite upbeat spin to it. The $1/watt is wholesale, farther in the article it's given as $2/watt installed, the plant won't open for a good year and things can happen in that time. Not the highest efficiency PV by any means (silicon crystalline can get over 20%, exotic methods go higher), but one of the better for thin-film production. It's definitely something to keep an eye on, but it won't kill the other solar power makers just yet. I think pretty much everybody is selling as fast as they can make the stuff.

 

Man bring this crap out already! I heard of that nano-solar place seemed cool, interesting new way to pump out solar. But I keep expecting some oil company like BP snatch them up then re-brand them at the $6-7/watt range that solar panels currently are floating at... But hearing other places doing it... don't know if I'm getting overly excited or what, but all I want to say is keep this local first! Don't start selling overseas!

I live in San Francisco (an idea of how sunny it is)... I would buy solar panels at this price range! (of course I'd install them myself)

 

Very exciting indeed. And at the very real risk of sounding like I want to rain on this parade... we hear these announcements every year. Usually several times per year. The magic cheap or efficient cells are just a couple of years away. The process is sound! We just can't quite produce them yet. Seriously, you can just plug in different universities and corporation names, and the story has remained the same for the 15 years that I've been following it. Like everything else, the panels have been improving incrementally forever.

That said, I'll be the biggest cheerleader if somebody can bring something this innovative to market. But just like with promised EVs and PHEVs, and Fuel Cell cars... if there's nothing on the market, there's nothing here to use.

 

And when I crawl under a well-intentioned array on a roof over at
Northeastern and read "Mobil Energy Corporation", something is just
horribly, horribly wrong.
.
_H*

 

This type of news has been put forth a number of times in the past few years. Evergreen solar was supposed to be able to do this two years ago but is still selling them for much more money. No solar company is going to price them low until the supply catches up with demand. They may be able to MAKE them for $1 a watt but they are going to sell them for whatever the market will bear. It will take a few companies making much larger volumes of panels to get the prices down not just one.

While it can be argued the price per watt for panels alone is currently about $4.50 a watt. I think at $3 a watt demand would double, and they would need to build many new factories to keep up. If they cannot keep up the price creeps back up.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(hampdenwireless @ Sep 24 2007, 11:45 PM) [snapback]517245[/snapback]</div>

This is quite true. There is currently a world-wide shortage of PV's (I think it's the silicon ingots) crimping the supply and driving up price. The lead time on new manufacturing capacity is quite long, and it hasn't caught up to the shot in the arm Germany, Japan, and California have given the market with their massive incentive programs. When capacity does catch up, it will be abrupt and things could get interesting. I'm holding out some hope that the price of PV's will do the same thing that the price of LCD flat panels has done over the last couple years. Although I'll settle for the slow 7% per year cost drop.

 

Darelldd: True enough, I just like to be optimistic about one thing that's "good"

Others: Also true, they might make $1 a watt, guess that means they'll make that much more.

Jweale: Last I heard (many years ago) Europe was literally snatching up all the PV arrays/cells they could from the US, which is why the demand here is so high (very little supply)

 

If silicon ingots were the issue, then new computers would cost much
more than $299 at wally-world and the whole chip fab industry would
be in a total shambles.
.
_H*

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(hobbit @ Sep 25 2007, 09:16 AM) [snapback]517357[/snapback]</div>

A computer does not need several metres squared of silicon wafer! (well, unless it's a Deep Blue! )

 

True, one slice of silicon about 1 foot in diameter is easily several hundred processors.