Chinese solar industry companies have already played a major role in lowering the cost of solar panels by almost half over the last year, The New York Times reports.
In an effort to boost market share, China's largest solar panel manufacturer, Suntech, is selling solar panels in the United States at below the cost of materials, assembly and shipping, Shi Zhengrong, the company's chief executive and founder, told the Times.
Solar companies in the West, meanwhile, are facing a tough time competing with their Chinese counterparts, which benefit from lower operating costs and government support.
Last week Germany's Q-Cells announced plans to lay off 500 of its 2,600 employees because of declining sales. Behind Tempe, Ariz.-based industry leader First Solar, Suntech is now on course to surpass Q-Cells as the world's second-largest supplier of photovoltaic cells this year.
Domestically, China's solar companies have been on the receiving end of generous subsidies from their Chinese national, provincial and local governments since March. Incentives include land for operations and funds for research and development as well as low-rate loans from state-owned banks. Electricity and labor costs are low as well, with fresh engineering graduates earning around $7,000 a year.
China's solar companies are also receiving "lavish" government support, the Times reports, to build assembly plants in the United States. In so doing, they bypass U.S. protectionist legislation. Even with the $2.3 billion tax credit program to manufacturers of clean energy equipment announced by the U.S. departments of Energy and Treasury this month, the American solar industry will also have to compete with their Chinese counterparts stateside.
Suntech plans to announce within the next two months its plans to build a $30 million solar panel assembly plant in Phoenix or somewhere in Texas. "It'll be to facilitate sales -- 'buy American' and things like that," Steven Chan, the company's president for global sales and marketing, told the Times.
About 90 percent of the plant's 75 to 150 workers will be blue-collar laborers, welding together panels from solar wafers made in China.
Last week China's Yingli Solar also announced a "preliminary plan" to assemble panels in the United States.
To avoid U.S. opposition to solar imports, Chinese solar companies are encouraging their U.S. executives to join industry trade groups, as Japanese automakers did when setting up U.S. operations decades ago.
"I don't see Europe or the United States becoming major producers of solar products -- they'll be consumers," said Thomas M. Zarrella, chief executive of Merrimack, N.H.-based GT Solar International, a company that sells specialized factory equipment to solar panel makers worldwide, the Times reports.
Source - Solar Daily
Showing posts with label solar panel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label solar panel. Show all posts
Monday, 31 August 2009
Monday, 27 October 2008
Husqvarna Launches Solar Powered Lawnmower
Husqvarna's Automower Solar Hybrid is a fully robotic lawn mower partly powered by the sun and uses no fuel or oil. Expanding its current fully-robotic lawn mower line, Husqvarna will launch the new mower in the U.S. at Green Industry and Equipment Expo (GIE + EXPO) 2008.
Powered by innovative and groundbreaking technology that combines solar power with electricity, the new Automower Solar Hybrid mower is more environmentally responsible and easy to program.
The Solar Hybrid mower is designed to handle lawns of up to a half acre. Incorporating solar and battery power, it uses considerably less energy than any conventional mower with its large integrated solar panel and is emissions-free.
When there is daylight available, the solar cells enable the mower to extend its cutting periods before requiring a recharge. Lower power consumption and an extended battery life enable a faster, more environmentally responsible cut.
A small wire is staked to the ground below the grass level, or buried just beneath it, around the perimeter of the lawn to be mowed. The on-board navigation system monitors its position relative to the wire keeping it in the area to be mowed. The irregular pattern of movement, the long battery life, and its ground speed enables it to effectively mow all parts of the lawn.
Obstacles or other areas within the lawn that should not be mowed are handled in one of two ways: if the object is rigid and at least six inches tall like trees or fences, the mower gently bumps into it, reverses, and starts off in another direction; other areas, like a flowerbed, are excluded from the cutting area by using the perimeter wire.
The Automower Solar Hybrid mower is programmable to be personalized via timer, and charges itself when required by returning to its base. The 22-pound mower cuts day or night, rain or shine and has a 4-digit pin code lock feature required to operate the mower and an alarm for security.
Other safety features include lightweight and out-of-reach blades and automatic shut off when the device is lifted from the ground.
Additionally, the three razor-like blades cut the grass cleanly and more often than a traditional mower which leaves shorter clippings that decompose faster and provide a natural fertilizer for an even better-looking yard.
Source- Solardaily
Powered by innovative and groundbreaking technology that combines solar power with electricity, the new Automower Solar Hybrid mower is more environmentally responsible and easy to program.
The Solar Hybrid mower is designed to handle lawns of up to a half acre. Incorporating solar and battery power, it uses considerably less energy than any conventional mower with its large integrated solar panel and is emissions-free.
When there is daylight available, the solar cells enable the mower to extend its cutting periods before requiring a recharge. Lower power consumption and an extended battery life enable a faster, more environmentally responsible cut.
A small wire is staked to the ground below the grass level, or buried just beneath it, around the perimeter of the lawn to be mowed. The on-board navigation system monitors its position relative to the wire keeping it in the area to be mowed. The irregular pattern of movement, the long battery life, and its ground speed enables it to effectively mow all parts of the lawn.
Obstacles or other areas within the lawn that should not be mowed are handled in one of two ways: if the object is rigid and at least six inches tall like trees or fences, the mower gently bumps into it, reverses, and starts off in another direction; other areas, like a flowerbed, are excluded from the cutting area by using the perimeter wire.
The Automower Solar Hybrid mower is programmable to be personalized via timer, and charges itself when required by returning to its base. The 22-pound mower cuts day or night, rain or shine and has a 4-digit pin code lock feature required to operate the mower and an alarm for security.
Other safety features include lightweight and out-of-reach blades and automatic shut off when the device is lifted from the ground.
Additionally, the three razor-like blades cut the grass cleanly and more often than a traditional mower which leaves shorter clippings that decompose faster and provide a natural fertilizer for an even better-looking yard.
Source- Solardaily
Wednesday, 16 July 2008
Weathering the energy storm with solar panels
A couple are hoping to weather the rising costs of fuel bills and make their home a more attractive purchase for the future by installing solar panels on its roof.
Although the panels will not provide electricity or domestic heating, they will provide a huge saving on the couple’s hot water bill.
Heat my Home, which is the company installing the panels later this month, says the panels can provide 70 per cent of a homeowner’s hot water needs and save up to 30 per cent on annual energy bills.
This could be money well saved as energy bills are rising, and some reports say they will increase by as much as 40 per cent this winter.
Mr Hayne, 72, a retired council highways inspector, said: “I was listening to the TV one night and it said houses in a couple of years are going to be built with solar panels, so I thought we might as well go ahead.
“We are hoping when we come to sell the house it will go easier and with the price rises on fuel, we may make a saving as well.”
The installation of the panels will also involve a new water tank being fitted, which will be large enough to cater for a family.
Mr Hayne said: “The solar runs all right even without sun, but if you get a cold spell then we might have to put on the immersion heater, so we will have that as a back-up.
“We decided to go ahead with it before the latest price rise, whether we make the back on the house by doing this.
“The main thing is our children will have no problem selling the house on after we are gone.”
The solar panels will only provide hot water, because the solar panel collection area needed to provide heating for a house would take up a far larger space than available on an average British home and would not be cost effective.
Having the panels can increase the value of a home, especially now Home Information Packs (HIPs) highlight energy efficiency.
Last week, it was announced household energy bills could rise by 20 per cent to pay for the cost of meeting the European Union’s 2020 emissions target.
A report called Costing the Earth stated this, coupled with the soaring cost of oil also contributing to rising energy bills, could push a lot of households in to fuel poverty. Wind power is currently the most popular form of renewable energy used in Britain.
Source - Getwokingham
Although the panels will not provide electricity or domestic heating, they will provide a huge saving on the couple’s hot water bill.
Heat my Home, which is the company installing the panels later this month, says the panels can provide 70 per cent of a homeowner’s hot water needs and save up to 30 per cent on annual energy bills.
This could be money well saved as energy bills are rising, and some reports say they will increase by as much as 40 per cent this winter.
Mr Hayne, 72, a retired council highways inspector, said: “I was listening to the TV one night and it said houses in a couple of years are going to be built with solar panels, so I thought we might as well go ahead.
“We are hoping when we come to sell the house it will go easier and with the price rises on fuel, we may make a saving as well.”
The installation of the panels will also involve a new water tank being fitted, which will be large enough to cater for a family.
Mr Hayne said: “The solar runs all right even without sun, but if you get a cold spell then we might have to put on the immersion heater, so we will have that as a back-up.
“We decided to go ahead with it before the latest price rise, whether we make the back on the house by doing this.
“The main thing is our children will have no problem selling the house on after we are gone.”
The solar panels will only provide hot water, because the solar panel collection area needed to provide heating for a house would take up a far larger space than available on an average British home and would not be cost effective.
Having the panels can increase the value of a home, especially now Home Information Packs (HIPs) highlight energy efficiency.
Last week, it was announced household energy bills could rise by 20 per cent to pay for the cost of meeting the European Union’s 2020 emissions target.
A report called Costing the Earth stated this, coupled with the soaring cost of oil also contributing to rising energy bills, could push a lot of households in to fuel poverty. Wind power is currently the most popular form of renewable energy used in Britain.
Source - Getwokingham
Tuesday, 22 January 2008
Solar energy 'revolution' brings green power closer
The holy grail of renewable energy came a step closer yesterday as thousands of mass-produced wafer-thin solar cells printed on aluminium film rolled off a production line in California, heralding what British scientists called "a revolution" in generating electricity.
The solar panels produced by a Silicon Valley start-up company, Nanosolar, are radically different from the kind that European consumers are increasingly buying to generate power from their own roofs. Printed like a newspaper directly on to aluminium foil, they are flexible, light and, if you believe the company, expected to make it as cheap to produce electricity from sunlight as from coal.
Yesterday Nanosolar said its order books were full until mid-2009 and that a second factory would soon open in Germany where demand for solar power has rocketed. Britain was unlikely to benefit from the technology for some years because other countries paid better money for renewable electricity, it added.
"Our first solar panels will be used in a solar power station in Germany," said Erik Oldekop, Nanosolar's manager in Switzerland. "We aim to produce the panels for 99 cents [50p] a watt, which is comparable to the price of electricity generated from coal. We cannot disclose our exact figures yet as we are a private company but we can bring it down to that level. That is the vision we are aiming at."
He added that the first panels the company was producing were aimed for large- scale power plants rather than for homeowners, and that the cost benefits would be in the speed that the technology could be deployed. "We are aiming to make solar power stations up to 10MW in size. They can be up and running in six to nine months compared to 10 years or more for coal-powered stations and 15 years for nuclear plants. Solar can be deployed very quickly," said Oldekop.
Nanosolar is one of several companies in Japan, Europe, China and the US racing to develop different versions of "thin film" solar technology. It is owned by internet entrepreneur Martin Roscheisen who sold his company to Yahoo for $450m and, with the help of the founders of Google, the US government and other entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley, has invested nearly $300m in commercialising the technology.
At the moment solar electricity costs nearly three times as much as conventional electricity to generate, but Nanosolar's developments are thought to have halved the price of producing conventional solar cells at a stroke.
"This is the world's lowest-cost solar panel, which we believe will make us the first solar manufacturer capable of profitably selling solar panels at as little as 99 cents a watt," said Roscheisen yesterday.
However, the company, which claims to lead the "third wave" of solar electricity, is notoriously secretive and has not answered questions about its panels' efficiency or their durability. It is quite open about wanting to restrict access to the technology to give it a market advantage.
source - scenta
The solar panels produced by a Silicon Valley start-up company, Nanosolar, are radically different from the kind that European consumers are increasingly buying to generate power from their own roofs. Printed like a newspaper directly on to aluminium foil, they are flexible, light and, if you believe the company, expected to make it as cheap to produce electricity from sunlight as from coal.
Yesterday Nanosolar said its order books were full until mid-2009 and that a second factory would soon open in Germany where demand for solar power has rocketed. Britain was unlikely to benefit from the technology for some years because other countries paid better money for renewable electricity, it added.
"Our first solar panels will be used in a solar power station in Germany," said Erik Oldekop, Nanosolar's manager in Switzerland. "We aim to produce the panels for 99 cents [50p] a watt, which is comparable to the price of electricity generated from coal. We cannot disclose our exact figures yet as we are a private company but we can bring it down to that level. That is the vision we are aiming at."
He added that the first panels the company was producing were aimed for large- scale power plants rather than for homeowners, and that the cost benefits would be in the speed that the technology could be deployed. "We are aiming to make solar power stations up to 10MW in size. They can be up and running in six to nine months compared to 10 years or more for coal-powered stations and 15 years for nuclear plants. Solar can be deployed very quickly," said Oldekop.
Nanosolar is one of several companies in Japan, Europe, China and the US racing to develop different versions of "thin film" solar technology. It is owned by internet entrepreneur Martin Roscheisen who sold his company to Yahoo for $450m and, with the help of the founders of Google, the US government and other entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley, has invested nearly $300m in commercialising the technology.
At the moment solar electricity costs nearly three times as much as conventional electricity to generate, but Nanosolar's developments are thought to have halved the price of producing conventional solar cells at a stroke.
"This is the world's lowest-cost solar panel, which we believe will make us the first solar manufacturer capable of profitably selling solar panels at as little as 99 cents a watt," said Roscheisen yesterday.
However, the company, which claims to lead the "third wave" of solar electricity, is notoriously secretive and has not answered questions about its panels' efficiency or their durability. It is quite open about wanting to restrict access to the technology to give it a market advantage.
source - scenta
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