The first 450 kilogram ingot was produced in less than 60 hours in the multi-crystalline ingot furnace developed by centrotherm SiTec, and has already achieved high quality standards.
"The system has impressively exceeded market standards with this commercial production run," commented Christian Hoess, Head of Crystallization Development. "The potentials of this technology have not yet been fully exhausted. This furnace type offers customers upgrade options to boost capacity by further 35% while at the same time entailing lower expenditure."
"With this "First Ingot Out" that we reached on a very ambitious timescale, we have shown that we can offer excellent technology along the entire solar value chain, and not only in the polysilicon and solar cell areas," noted Albrecht Mozer, Managing Director of centrotherm SiTec.
"As a provider of technology and key equipment along the entire solar value chain, we enable our customers to implement optimally integrated production processes entailing low operating costs and outstanding quality."
Further multi-crystalline ingot furnaces are currently being installed and ramped up at Chinese state company. In the multi-crystalline ingot furnace, polysilicon chunks are initially melt in a silica crucible at over 1,450° Celsius. The silicon melt is then converted into multi-crystalline ingots by a process of directional solidification.
Bricks and wafers are subsequently cut from these multicrystalline ingots, before being processed to produce solar cells and modules.
