ARISE Technologies Corporation Announces Start of Construction of PV Cell Manufacturing Plant
ARISE Technologies Corporation Announces Start of Construction of PV Cell Manufacturing Plant and Update on High Efficiency PV Cell Program
Waterloo, ON, Aug. 30, 2007
Source. Artse Technologies press release
http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/August2007/30/c4225.html
ARISE Technologies Corporation announced today that it has started construction of its photovoltaic cell manufacturing plant in Bischofswerda, Germany. HOCHTIEF Construction AG, the general contractor for the project is on site and has started construction. The Company expects to have the building weather tight before the end of this year and to be producing PV cells early in the 2nd quarter of 2008. Pictures of the construction site are located at
http://www.arisetech.com/content/view/137/98/
The initial PV Cell production line will be supplied by OTB Solar B.V. and is a ‘turnkey’ inline, fully integrated production system. The Company entered into an equipment supply agreement in March 2007, which included specific performance and delivery time commitments. The standard ‘off-the-shelf” equipment is currently being fabricated. The use of proven equipment for the initial line will allow ARISE to establish a base manufacturing process without introducing new technology risk while ramping up production. The Company expects to ramp-up the first line to a productin capacity of 35MW per year with cell efficiency of greater than 15%. By the end of 2007, the Company expects to finalize the design for line two and place orders with suppliers. Currently, the Company plans to start including it proprietary technology in line two, with a target capacity of 45MW per year and cell efficiency of 18%. The initial Bischofswerda facility will accommodate a third line that is planned for 2009, increasing total production capacity to 125MW.
The Company has a target of eight lines at the site, with a total production capacity of 360MW per year by the end of 2012. Provided that certain technical hurdles are met, ARISE expects to achieve 22% cell efficiency with the use of its proprietary PV cell process enhancements by that time.
The Company will use a ‘Technology Pull’ methodology to add these planned enhancements to its production lines to ensure that added production capacity is not delayed due to on-going development efforts. Ian MacLellan, President and CEO stated, “Each production line has an implementation plan focused on starting the line on a specific date and manufacturing selects or “pulls” the technology that is ready for integration at that time. The default is the next line is the same as the previous working line. This approach reduces technology risk and provides a more predictable production ramp-up, which is very important to our customers. We believe that making the timing the priority significantly reduces our business risk”.
The Company continues to make significant progress on PV research through the addition of new equipment to the thin film experimental facilities at the University of Toronto. Recent experimental results show successful passivation of the thin film silicon substrate interface using the DC saddle-field source, a key part of the Company’s high efficiency technology roadmap.
Ian MacLellan, President and CEO stated, “We are very pleased with our progress and the fact we are still on our original schedule defined at the beginning of this project in December 2006. With ARISE Germany fully funded,
all the key partners selected and construction started, we are confident that we will continue to meet our project schedule in Germany.”
About ARISE
ARISE Technologies is dedicated to accelerating the use of solar energy in mainstream North American markets. The Company has three operations: Photovoltaic (PV) Technology, Silicon Feedstock and Systems.