Explosion disrupts Taiwan solar cell material plant
TAIPEI, Reuters / 19 December 2006
source: Chinapost.com
http://www.chinapost.com.tw/news/archives/business/20061219/97924.htm
An explosion at a plant operated by Taiwan’s Green Energy Technology Inc., a maker of solar cell raw materials, has left two dead, and disrupted some of the company’s output, a spokesman said yesterday. The explosion occurred on Sunday at one of the company’s 26 crystal growing systems, a spokesman said, adding that two other crystal growing systems were also affected. He said the cause of the explosion is under investigation.
“The company forecasts that effects to its capacity from this incident will not be big,” Green Energy said in a statement.
Green Energy Technology shares fell by as much as 9.2 percent during the trading session, before paring some of the losses to close down 3.82 percent.
The spokesman declined to name any of his company’s major customers.
The Taiwan company is a sub-contracted wafer maker for MEMC Electronics Materials Inc., a major supplier to leading Chinese solar cell maker Suntech Power Holdings, based in the city of Wuxi near Shanghai.
Suntech Power spokesman Steven Chan said the explosion had no impact on the firm’s operations. “(Green Energy) is only one of the wafer makers and it’s only one out of the 24 furnaces that was impacted by the fire,” Chan said by telephone.
Motech Industries, a Taiwan-based solar cell maker, told the Economic Daily that Green Energy was not among its top 10 suppliers