PV modules

The giants of the Chinese PV industry are now integrated along both ends of the supply chain, amid expectations for strong demand and price volatility. Module makers are adding polysilicon capacity, while poly and wafer producers are making module production a part of their business. But do companies still face the same risks that have brought down vertically integrated solar giants in the past? Vincent Shaw reports from Shanghai.

India is seeing massive investments in PV manufacturing, with manufacturers from Western countries, led by the United States, eager to get in on the act. Chinese companies have yet to make the same call, however.

While it comes with clear performance advantages, the move to larger module formats has created plenty of confusion since it began in 2019. As the dust settles and standards emerge, pv magazine caught up with Hongbin Fang, director of product marketing at Longi Solar, to discuss the latest on wafer and cell dimensions.

Cost efficiency while maximizing power output is the name of the game in solar project development and asset management. And the automation of the provision of utility scale solar operations and maintenance (O&M) is fast becoming one of the most compelling opportunities. Help shape the future of automation in solar O&M by completing this first-of-its kind survey.

Sujoy Ghosh, First Solar’s vice president for India and the Asia-Pacific region, speaks to pv magazine about the company’s plans to set up a 3.3 GW module fab in India to service the local market.

Rising efficiencies and the plummeting cost of solar modules over the past few years, recent months notwithstanding, are leading innovators toward ideas that may look unusual in the current tracker-dominated world of large-scale solar parks. Advocates of the new approaches argue that they leave traditional models looking decidedly flat by comparison.

PV module making is a brutally competitive industry. And for Slovenian module maker Bisol, in business since 2004, one of the keys to success has been to remain focused on the value its products deliver to the customer. And as company founder and CEO Uroš Merc explains, in 2021 this means reimagining module degradation.

Chinese PV module maker JinkoSolar unveiled its new 610 W Tiger Pro TR solar modules on Saturday at the SNEC PV Power Expo in Shanghai. Furthermore, bifacial module specialist Jolywood launched the Niwa Super module series, which has a power output ranging from 570 W to 615 W and a reported efficiency of 22.1%.

India possesses almost 11 GW of domestic solar module production capacity and around 3 GW of cell output annually. With a national goal of 100 GW of solar generation capacity by 2022, the creation of a domestic manufacturing base is of critical significance for the country which currently imports almost 85% of the 10 GW of PV equipment it consumes annually.

The nation installed 4.9 GW of solar, surpassing the USA – which installed 4.7 GW – to become the second largest solar market in the first half of the year, second only to China’s 24.3 GW.