Solar Cells Info

Country committed to reductions in output of greenhouse gases
Simon Burns in Taipei, vnunet.com,  14 Aug 2007
http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2196566/
pollution-boost-japan-solar

Solar cell makers are expected to increase sales in Japan as the government struggles to reduce atmospheric pollution.  Despite efforts to clean up industry and transport in the home of the Kyoto Protocol, environmental officials predicted last week that the country will exceed its original target for greenhouse gas emissions by more than 170 million tonnes by 2010.  This would mean the country missing its obligations under the Kyoto Protocol by 20 to 34 million tonnes, the government admitted.
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by Shigeru Sato and Megumi Yamanaka, Bloomberg News
Tokyo, August 15, 2007
Source: International Herald Tribune
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/08/15/business/sxsolar.php

Showa Shell Sekiyu, the Japanese unit of Royal Dutch Shell, will build a plant to make solar-powered cells in Japan, quadrupling its capacity.  The company plans to construct its second factory in Japan’s southwestern prefecture of Miyazaki, at a cost of ¥15 billion, or $128 million, to produce solar-powered cells that can collectively generate 60 megawatts of electricity annually, Showa Shell, which is based in Tokyo, said Wednesday. The new plant would be adjacent to the company’s existing 20 megawatt cell plant.
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* Booming demand for solar energy systems spurs photovoltaic production
* Innovative thin-film technologies on the advance
* Productronica exhibitors display technologies for the complete photovoltaic production chain from silicon to ready-to-operate solar modules in the “MicroNanoWorld” exhibition area

Source:
http://www.presseagentur.com/mmi/detail.php?pr_id=1450&lang=en

Electricity costs are increasing, and consumers are looking for alternatives. In 2005 alone, solar energy systems with an overall output of 912 megawatts (MW) were installed in roofs and in open areas in Germany compared to only 597 MW in the previous year (Source: PHOTON International). This makes Germans the world champions in matters of “green electricity”, because systems for a total of 290 MW were installed in Japan and for 100 MW in the USA in the same period, for example.
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By Kinga Dema, Kuensel Online, 20 August 2007
Source: Kuensel Online (Bhutan’s news)
http://www.kuenselonline.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=8917

The Japan Fund for Poverty Reduction is sponsoring 26 rural Bhutanese women to be trained in India in the use and maintenance of solar equipment in their villages.  According to the Department of Energy, the executing agency, the women, who left for India on August 17, were selected from 18 villages from across the country. They will be trained for six months in Rajasthan Barefoot College, a community based non-governmental organisation.
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by Andrea Eilenberger, The Express-Times
Phillipsburg, August 24, 2007
By ANDREA EILENBERGER

Town planning board members Thursday night approved the manufacturer’s plan to construct a canopy to support solar panels. Using the panels will save the Riverside Way plant about 25 percent of its regular energy use per year, plant manager Raymond Freaney said.  Alternative use is “definitely an initiative throughout the state,” Freaney said.
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New Delhi, Delhi, India, Aug 22, 2007
Source: IndiaPRWire.com
http://www.indiaprwire.com/businessnews/20070822/24040.htm

Some 25,000 villages in India will get solar energy by 2012 as part of the government’s plan to promote clean energy in the country, Minister for New and Renewable Energy Vilas Muttemwar said here Wednesday.  ‘With such a vast pool of renewable resources available, the government wants to provide energy in every village and lighting in every house,’ Muttemwar said in his address at an event to mark Energy Day in memory of late prime minister Rajiv Gandhi.
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Aug. 23, 2007 /Energy Tribune Staff
Source. EnergyTribune.com
http://www.energytribune.com/articles.cfm?aid=608

India is getting a share of the booming global market for photovoltaic panels. California-based Signet Solar recently announced that it will invest $2 billion over the next decade to set up three solar photovoltaic manufacturing units in India.  When completed, each of the three plants will have an annual output of 300 megawatts. Signet Solar chairman and founder Prabhu Goel said he was “convinced that India is ideal for manufacturing the world’s lowest-cost solar modules.” The company is also planning a research and development center in India.
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New Delhi, Aug. 21, 2007
Source: PTI / The Hindu online
http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/218200708212123.htm

Reliance Industries, India’s biggest oil firm by market value, will soon foray into solar power generation through pilot projects that will supply electricity to a few villages in Maharashtra.  “In the next 8-12 months, pilots will be launched in 38 villages in Maharashtra. These will not be connected with the grid and the solar ecosystems will provide power to these villages,” RIL Chairman and Managing Director Mukesh Ambani said here.
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By Sally Apgar, South Florida Sun-Sentinel
West Palm Beach, FL, September 1, 2007
Source: South Florida Sun Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/palmbeach/
sfl-flpsolartrain0901pnsep01,0,6274584.story

WEST PALM BEACH – People are waiting on the “Solar City” train platform. One is a businessman, sporting a 1950s-era brown fedora. His gray suit jacket hangs over his left arm and a brown briefcase dangles from his right hand. He looks almost like he’s sweating in the hot sun. A long-legged boy in a red T-shirt and shorts is lounging on a wooden bench, hot dog in hand.
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Woodbury, N.Y., Aug. 23, 2007
Source: Veeco Instruments Inc. Press release
http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=111487&p=NewsArticle&id=1043116

Veeco Instruments Inc. (Nasdaq:VECO) has introduced a line of new production-scale PV-Series(TM) Thermal Deposition Sources, enabling copper indium gallium selenide (CIGS) thin film solar manufacturers to more quickly transition from pilot to full scale solar cell production. Veeco’s new line of thermal deposition sources for CIGS includes PV-Series SUMO(R) (for copper, indium and gallium) and PV-Series Valved (for selenium and sulfur) for R & D and production environments. (more…)