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Heliatek: World’s First Company to Manufacture and Commercialize Organic Solar Cells

The first organic solar cell has come from Switzerland. It seems somehow normal that the first practical application and the first organic solar cell manufacturer to come from Germany - doesn't it?

Sharp Breaks New Record With Its Concentrated Photovoltaic Cells

Sharp has worked closely with the University of Tokyo, and aims breaking the record again with 45% by 2015 and even to reach 50% by 2025. The company says that at 45% the cost of solar will finally reach that of nuclear and thermal power plants.

Wind Tunnel Concept Converts Wind Energy Generated by Subway Trains into Electricity

Metropolitan cities around the world build more and more underground subway systems in order to minimize the number of vehicles on the roads. The industrial designers also though to help city authorities by redesigning the current systems, making them more efficient.

Wind Tunnel Concept Converts Wind Energy Generated by Subway Trains into Electricity

Locally Grown Biofuels Promoted and Funded by U.S. Government

The Obama Administration wants to help the biofuel industry develop. The government is thus investing $8.9 million to award nine companies in seven states for improving their genetic breeding programs for creating plants better suited for biofuel.

Mitsubishi Proposes Highway Mobile Chargers for Electric Vehicles

The Vehicular Technology Conference, hosted in Ottawa, Canada, next week, will be the place where Zafer Sahinoglu at the Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and his colleagues will present an innovation aimed to patch the issues electric cars and their limited battery range have: the mobile battery charger.

Mitsubishi Proposes Highway Mobile Chargers for Electric Vehicles

Advanced PV Module Assembly Line Introduced By Spire

BEDFORD, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Spire Corporation (Nasdaq: SPIR), a global solar company providing capital equipment and turnkey manufacturing lines to manufacture photovoltaic (PV) modules and cells, today announced the introduction of its SPI-Line™ 20 megawatt (MW) per year Module Assembly Line at the 25th European PV Solar Energy Conference and Exhibition (EU PVSEC) in Valencia, Spain at the Feria Valencia, located at Level 2, Hall 4, Booth 15.

The SPI-Line 20MW PV Module Assembly Line offers new entrants into the PV market a greater than 30% reduction in normalized capital expenditure (CAPEX), expanding customers’ capability and cost reduction per watt of module production. The line incorporates Spire’s advanced SPI-AssemblerTM 7000, SPI-Sun SimulatorTM 4600SLP, the SPI-LaminatorTM 1837, other essential manufacturing and testing equipment, as well as Spire’s process technology and support services.

Roger G. Little, Chairman and CEO of Spire Corporation, said, “As the market leader in turnkey module lines, Spire provides customers with the greatest value by ensuring high throughput, high yield module production at the lowest cost of capital.”

GT Solar Announces Next Generation Reactor

MERRIMACK, N.H.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--GT Solar International, Inc. (NASDAQ: SOLR), a global provider of polysilicon production technology, and sapphire and silicon crystalline growth systems and materials for the solar, LED and other specialty markets, today announced the SDR™400 next generation CVD reactor for the production of high purity polysilicon. The SDR400 reactor can produce greater than 400 metric tons annually (MTA) of polysilicon. The new SDR400 also lowers electricity consumption by approximately 20 percent for each kilogram of polysilicon produced over the company’s previous generation reactor, the SDR300.

“Our new SDR400 CVD reactor further extends our polysilicon production technology leadership,” said Dave Keck, vice president and general manager of GT Solar’s polysilicon division. “Customers can produce 33 percent more polysilicon annually in the same footprint using approximately 20 percent less electricity for every kilogram of polysilicon produced. This lowers their cost of ownership and strengthens their competitive position.”

GT Solar also announced that it is partnering with German-based AEG Power Solutions to offer a new power supply developed by AEG, the Thryobox™ PI, that is designed to further enhance the output of the SDR400 reactor. The new power supply will be offered as an option to the standard SDR400 configuration and is targeted to increase annual polysilicon production to greater than 500 MTA. Current GT Solar customers using previous generation reactors will be able to upgrade these systems to take advantage of the expected increased annual production output.

Sanyo Saves Air Conditioning/Lighting Energy In Offices By Using Camera System

Sanyo Electric Co., in an initiative to reduce their carbon footprint and at the same time to save money, is experimenting with a system composed of cameras that assess how many persons are in a certain room and regulates air conditioning and lighting according to the results.