shingled cells

M10 Solar Equipment, a German joint venture, may have shown Europe’s solar manufacturers how to scale their gigafactories by using Siemens’ plant simulation software to ramp up production of its innovative shingled-matrix solar cell production equipment, explains Tobias Wachtmann, director of global glass and solar for Siemens.

While shingled cells have been around for a while, Tongwei’s adoption of the technology is notable as it is a manufacturer with considerable scale. If shingling can overcome some hurdles, it could prove a welcome solution as unshaded sites for PV become elusive in mature solar markets.

Researchers in Singapore have created a flexible framework for designing hotspot-resistant shingled modules. Their work is claimed to be perfectly compatible with existing manufacturing techniques.

Researchers in Korea have proposed a new design for dividing and bonding which is said to provide higher efficiency from fewer fingers. The number of fingers optimized for division into five cells was 128 and for three, 171. Five offer power conversion efficiency of 17.346% and three 16.855%.

Ukraine’s favorite solar module manufacturer has posted another encouraging set of returns, after a difficult year in 2018. And Risen – which boasted 6.6 GW of annual production capacity at the end of last year, according to analysts at PV InfoLink – is committed to adding another 2.5 GW before 2022.

While lacking the swarming crowds of previous years, the 2019 SNEC in Shanghai remained a focal point of the global PV industry when it comes to industrial solar cell and module manufacturing and technology. Here are five hot technology takeaways from the pv magazine team on the show floor and conference sessions.