SunPower’s Solar Panels Power the Winning Team at the Third Solar Decathlon in Wash., D.C.
Technische Universitat Darmstadt of Germany Takes Top Honors
San Jose, CA., Oct 22, 2007
Source: SunPower Corp. / press release
http://investors.sunpowercorp.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=270358
SunPower Corp. (Nasdaq: SPWR), a Silicon Valley-based manufacturer of high-efficiency solar cells, solar panels and solar systems, today announced that the team of students from Technische Universitat Darmstadt of Germany has won the 2007 Solar Decathlon, by building a house powered by SunPower’s high-efficiency solar panels. This marks the second consecutive Solar Decathlon where SunPower’s solar panels were used by the competition’s winning team. SunPower solar panels also powered the Decathlon’s third place winner, Santa Clara University from Calif.
The 2007 Solar Decathlon, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), was held October 12th through October 19th on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Twenty teams of college and university students from the United States and Puerto Rico, Canada, Spain, and Germany competed this month to design, build and operate the most attractive, effective and energy-efficient solar-powered homes.
SunPower’s industry-leading, high-efficiency silicon solar panels were used by nine of the 20 competing teams for this year’s competition, including Carnegie Mellon, Georgia Institute of Technology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, New York Institute of Technology, Santa Clara University, Technische Universitat Darmstadt, the University of Cincinnati, the University of Colorado, and the Universidad de Puerto Rico. Additionally, SunPower panels powered five of the seven homes that scored a perfect 100 points in the Energy Balance contest, which requires teams to use only energy generated by the solar electric systems during the competition.
“SunPower congratulates all the participating schools for their design and engineering innovation,” said Tom Werner, CEO of SunPower Corp. “The DOE’s leadership in the 2007 Solar Decathlon, as well as the Solar America Initiative, has established a credible path for solar to become a substantial portion of new power capacity in the U.S. within the decade.”
“How appropriate that teams from two of the biggest solar markets in the world, Germany and California, took first and third place using SunPower’s high-efficiency solar panels,” continued Werner. “This month’s Solar Decathlon has come at a very important time, as Congress works to complete an energy bill with key provisions that could expand solar energy across the U.S. By following the leadership of Germany and California, Congress could extend and expand the federal solar investment tax credit to potentially accelerate adoption of solar power — a domestic, renewable and reliable energy resource.