Nanosolar has just announced that, after five years of development, it will be shipping its innovative “solar film” product. Basically, Nanosolar is able to print solar panels on machines that resemble printing presses. The company, whose backers include Google’s co-founders, say it is producing the world’s lowest-cost solar panel, costing as little as 99 cents per watt.
What will Nanosolar be doing with the first three commercial panels?
- Panel #1 will remain at Nanosolar for exhibit.
- Panel #2 can be purchased by you in an auction on eBay starting today.
- Panel #3 has been donated to the Tech Museum in San Jose.
Nanosolar is a heavily financed Silicon Valley start-up. The company has raised $150 million and built a 200,000-square-foot factory.
To make solar film, Nanosolar prints CIGS (copper-indium-gallium-selenium) onto a thin polymer. There is no costly silicon involved in the process. Nanosolar is only a few years old, but it has laid plans to take on multinational corporations, such as BP and Sharp, in the solar industry.
Via: NanoSolar Blog
11 responses so far ↓
1 dude // Dec 18, 2007 at 9:18 pm
“no costly silicon involved”?
yeah, like that gallium/indium compound is going to be cheap.
right.
2 EfficiencySeeker // Dec 19, 2007 at 5:04 am
I wonder how efficiently it can turn sunlight into electricity compared to silicon solar cells. I could not find any info on this product.
3 Bill Haynes // Dec 22, 2007 at 2:19 pm
EMPS Electronic Magnetic Power Solutions has the most efficent converter/inverter design in the world. It is also very inexpensive to produce. A 5kw electronic Converter/inverter
with a 98% utility intertie efficency weighs only 20 pounds in case. Please go to 6phase.com for more exciting information.
4 John // Dec 22, 2007 at 7:45 pm
First hit on google for “nanosolar efficiency” is they should by about 19% efficient. That’s irrelevant (mostly) anyway, because what you care about is cost/watt which the article gives as ~$1 which is at least 10x better than current commercial and comparable or better than industrial power plants ($1/watt installed capacity is the rule of thumb there). As long as they’re better than 10% and you have a roof you’re set.
“Costly silicon” refers not to the cost of sand, but the energy cost of refinement to six nines (99.9999 %) purity. A more relevant cost issue is installation for these things. To put up a post construction array on a roof is about half the cost for current cells, and for these in the article, the installation would more or less dominate the cost, unless their lighter flexible construction permits a cheaper installation cost.
5 Ben // Dec 31, 2007 at 12:38 pm
In reference to “costly silicon:”
You might note that since these cells are “film” based semiconductors, you’re going to use less material to make a cell than you would to make a silicon solar cell. I believe most silicon based solar cells are made using more conventional semiconductor manufacturing methods (i.e. take a big chunk of silicon and then dope it). Making solar cells using these conventional techniques requires quite a bit of material.
6 randy forbes // Jan 18, 2008 at 12:12 pm
we are manufacturers of very efficient radiant
heating equipment with a 30 year history.
I know the future is solar and wind and I would
like to be in a position to distribute your breakthrough product in Canada.
Your film will change the world and I have a use
for this product that you haven’t thought of.
7 average person // Jan 26, 2008 at 6:35 pm
You say its available on ebay but where is it? All I see is people coming up with great new technology at low cost. Where is it? how come nobody can buy this stuff, why isn’t this solar film on the market and being sold somewhere. It’s all talk a bunch of bull. Big talkers no action. same thing with fuel cells a bunch of talk but no action.
8 Jaime Soto Figueroa // Jan 28, 2008 at 10:27 am
Hi Average Person
Just go to http://blog.nanosolar.com/ , the first panels are about to reach the market soon. Look this news of December 18 2007.
Jaime Soto Figueroa
http://www.matharts.cl/
9 Jaime Soto Figueroa // Jan 30, 2008 at 4:38 pm
No way to get a simple data sheet on this technology, impossible to buy a small amount to do a test……Well, this company is aimed to sell these new panels only to giant integrators, not to distributors, so this product will not be available for small entrepreneurs. So better wait to the Chinese for if they can have a similar product soon………its life.
10 dushyant barot // Apr 1, 2008 at 9:20 am
great ! but how exactly to buy it.can i buy it online? is its output comparable or better than existing panels
11 luciana reis // May 26, 2008 at 6:36 am
I’m really interested to have a technical data sheet for this product.
Anyone know about some company, as described above as “giant integrators”, who suposed are buying from them, to try to buy from?
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