Most of the world's solar equipment uses polysilicon as the key material to turn sunlight into electricity. Other makers are turning to the emerging thin-film technology, a lower-cost choice that doesn't suffer from a shortage of raw materials.

Nantong Qiangsheng Photovoltaic Technology Co, a fledgling amorphous-silicon thin-film-based solar firm, recently announced it will build a 28-million-yuan one-megawatt plant in Rudong, Jiangsu Province. That's about 40 percent of the cost for a traditional solar plant of the same capacity.

Sha Xiaolin, Qiangsheng's chairman, said the generation cost of its Rudong project will be less than three yuan per kilowatt-hour.

In comparison, the cost of traditional polysilicon-based solar-power generation is about four yuan per kwh, more than 10 times that of conventional coal-fired generation. This makes commercialization of solar cells unrealistic without government subsidies, and has forced Chinese solar-cell makers to export more than 90 percent of their products to nations where solar generation is subsidized.

Sha said its generation costs would further drop to one yuan per kwh in three years after expanding thin-film production lines. Qiangsheng has signed deals to build another two solar projects this year in South Korea and Spain.

Sha believes thin-film technology will grab an increasing share of the solar-cell market given its low costs, even if polysilicon prices fall some day.

Usually, thin-film PV cells are less efficient in converting energy than polysilicon-based cells, but they work better in weak light conditions and can be used on walls.

So far, many solar-cell generators in China are not connected to the national grid for lack of preferential pricing, although the government has vowed to speed up policies on subsidies and tax incentives. The only forms of renewable energy that are competitive in China without subsidies are solar heaters and hydropower projects.

(Shanghai Daily March 20, 2008)

 

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