Magazine Archive

Audits in China: Bankability is no easy process and includes a thorough technical audit of the company manufacturing the solar panels. Accelios Solar GmbH has perfected a point system to measure the quality of PV module production and its audit of HT-SAAE provides a textbook example of how this auditing process works.

Feed-in tariffs: Australia jumped the gun on its planned FIT cuts. France is jumping on the domestic content bandwagon and planning to move to an auction system. Germany greatly overshot its target ‘corridor,’ triggering steep degressions in the coming months. And the Tennessee Valley Authority has tweaked its incentive program.

Power to gas solution: The electricity grid is under pressure to restructure itself to accept more renewable power. Power has been generated from gas conventionally. Now there is a practical option to go the other way too, power to gas, giving renewable-generated power a smart solution for storage and use.

Smart inverters: With the popularity of PV prompting a move away from large centralized power generators to numerous decentralized small-scale generators, the latest generation of inverters have a significant part to play in modernizing grids for a renewables age, as TÜV Süd’s Christian Dirmeier and Ma Zhengdong explain.

Chinese factory gate prices: Chinese tier-1 and tier-2 module suppliers are working hard to keep prices stable.

TCO layer deposition: Aluminum-doped zinc oxide (AZO) thin films have been deposited using an in-line ETP-CVD production process at Roth & Rau. ETP-CVD allows high deposition speed, reduces system size and decreases running costs. It can be applied to deposition on foils. For CIGS module production, the cost of ownership for AZO will go towards €1/m² . Roth & Rau’s Manager of Innovations Roel Bosch provides the latest information on the deposition technology, performance and cost.

Laser scribing: Widely used in silicon thin film PV production, lasers still have a way to go to be used to the same extent in CIGS production.

Net metering: A new net metering scheme should help Israel’s solar PV market grow more quickly in 2013 and there are signs that grid parity may soon be achieved.

Industry consolidation: Solar PV is a major pillar of the Hanwha Group’s strategy for “quality growth” in the future. Its acquisition, completed in October, of the bankrupt Q.Cells is a clear part of this strategy. As the new venture Hanwha Q.Cells was launched, company representatives chose to highlight synergies between the companies. But how good is the fit and how long will Hanwha remain committed to PV in the face of losses from its PV business segment? pv magazine investigates.

Dear readers, Will it or will it not happen? Many visitors at this year’s Renewable Energy India Expo asked themselves this question. The reason being that during the three day trade exhibition in November, a thick smog covered the megacity and the sun only managed to penetrate the yellowish-gray veil on a few occasions. “The […]