Equipment Makers Showcase Bold Advancements at PVJapan 2010

By Charles Annis, Vice President of Asia Operations, Solarbuzz

On June 29, Solarbuzz revised its 2010 demand forecast up nearly 40% to 15.2 GW. The worldwide PV market is now expected to more than double in size this year! The solar industry is in the midst of yet another tremendous up cycle. Excitement about end market demand was clearly evident on the floor of PVJapan 2010, held in Yokohama from June 30 through July 2. But optimistic PV supply chain companies are anything but complacent.

With severe competition in all segments, PVJapan exhibitors were eagerly touting the improvements they are continuously making to their products. Solar cell manufacturing equipment is one area where makers continue to dramatically increase productivity. Crystalline silicon diffusion furnaces and turn-key a-Si thin film fabs are two examples from PVJapan that illustrated this trend.

Koyo Thermo Systems introduced its new in-line diffusion furnace that offers substantially increased productivity over its batch tool. Having worked closely with Sharp for many years, Koyo has more than 30 years of experience in manufacturing diffusion furnaces. The diffusion furnace market is cycling around $200 million per year, and with its new in-line high productivity tool, Koyo hopes to increase its share, particularly in the high capacity growth regions of Taiwan and China.

Even though silicon prices haven fallen significantly in the past two years and interest in new a-Si fabs has waned, Tokyo Electron (TEL)—Oerlikon Solar’s exclusive sales representative in parts of Asia—provided a very upbeat outlook for the future prospects of thin film Si during the Manufacturing Equipment Technical Seminar.

TEL’s optimism is based on their belief that a-Si TF offers more energy yield than other PV cell technologies in some applications. Oerlikon has also increased throughput by 50%, reduced module costs by 50% and doubled their capacity output in just the past two years.

 As exhibited at PVJapan, equipment makers are constantly pushing the productivity envelope to make continuous and substantial improvements. This increases competitiveness, but at the same time, it means that solar cell manufacturers are able to produce more with fewer machines and smaller investments, which is one important reason why solar module costs and prices continue to fall. Thankfully, lower prices make PV generated electricity cheaper and that pushes demand. Greater demand will require more and more manufacturing facilities to be built.