Stion has supplied 6.48 kW of high-performance CIGSS solar modules to the innovative Start.Home, Stanford Universitys entry in the 2013 Solar Decathlon, hosted by the U.S. Department of Energy. First held in 2002, the Solar Decathlon challenges university teams from all over the globe to design, build, and showcase housing solutions focused on cost effectiveness and energy efficiency.
The Start.Home concept is a modular home designed around a central CORE that contains the majority of the mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems. This CORE is intended to be assembled in a factory and transported to the home site for integration with the rest of the building. Producing the pre-engineered CORE in a controlled manufacturing environment rather than the field will enable increased system quality and performance and while decreasing total cost.
Stanford's visionary Start.Home CORE is powered by 48 of Stion's STN-135 Watt Elevation Series Solar Modules connected to connected to 12 Tigo Energy MM-2ES75 dual module maximizers and one SMA Sunny Boy 6000-US string inverter. Derek Ouyang, Project Manager for Start.Home, stated "It's a lot cheaper than monocrystalline. It also uses a lot less material, we really liked that about these panels."
Stion's proprietary, monolithically integrated CIGSS high-efficiency thin-film solar modules use significantly less energy and raw materials in the production process than crystalline silicon based PV modules.
