China's solar cell industrialization is on the lookout

The first "China made" high-end thin-film solar cell key production equipment in Shanghai off the assembly line

On the 8th, China's first plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD), a key production equipment for thin-film solar cells representing the international advanced level, successfully went offline in Shanghai, which is regarded as China's achievement in high-end equipment for new energy sources. Zero breakthrough." "China-made" PECVD performance is ahead of similar foreign products, the price is significantly lower than the latter, the domestic industrialization of thin-film solar cells is expected to speed up.

First localization of PECVD: The industrialization of thin-film solar cells is expected to accelerate

The creation of this breakthrough is the ideal energy equipment company registered in Pudong Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park. According to the company's general manager, Qian Xuejun, a piece of “1.1 m×1.4 m” ordinary plate glass was covered with a conductive layer, and then it entered the PECVD reaction chamber to complete the lamination of the chemical meteorological material lamination. The thickness was increased by two. Micron, that is, a thin film solar cell with a conversion rate of up to 10%.

In August 2009, Dr. Qian Xueyi, a Chinese resident of the United States, established an ideal energy company with more than 20 experts who have had extensive experience in world-class companies in equipment, processes, and management. For more than a year, the company has completed the R&D, pilot testing, and offline production of the first PECVD machine and applied for more than 10 core technology patents.

According to reports, the device uses innovative UHF radio frequency technology, precision vacuum and temperature control technology, rapid automatic transmission technology and multi-cavity multi-chip reaction chamber systems, which greatly increase the production capacity, its product performance is better than international First-rate equipment, but the price is much lower than the equivalent imported equipment.

Qian Xueyu said: "If you import one such device from abroad to two or three hundred million yuan, we can only produce about 100 million yuan. The annual production capacity of a device is about 15 megawatts, and three devices can be formed. A production line with an annual capacity of nearly 50 megawatts."

According to Li Dong, Deputy Director of the Department of Equipment Industry of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the successful development of key production equipment for high-end thin-film solar cells has laid a solid foundation for the development of China's new energy industry.

"The world's largest" solar cell market "equipment" weakness

Statistics show that in the past five years, the world's solar cell market has grown by an average of 40% per year. The international solar industry industry expects that the market will usher in explosive growth in the next 3-5 years. In 2007, China had become the world's largest solar cell producer, accounting for more than one quarter of the global market share.

Nan Cunhui, Chairman of Chint Group, who has made rapid progress in the field of new energy in recent years, deeply understands: “Chengtai sold 100 megawatts of solar cells last year, and orders for this year exceeded 500 megawatts, and it is still unable to meet customers. demand."

However, "manufacturing a big country" is not yet a "manufacturing power." This is particularly evident in the field of silicon-based thin-film solar cells that are considered "second-generation technologies." This kind of battery is made by depositing thin photovoltaic materials on substrates such as glass, metal or plastic. It can still generate electricity under low light conditions. It can be applied to large-scale photovoltaic power plants, and can also be made flexible and translucent. Battery, realizing real-world BIPV application. In addition, the battery can greatly reduce the energy consumption of the production process. However, in the production of high-end amorphous microcrystalline laminated solar cells, the production equipment of Chinese companies once relied on imports. The key production equipment PECVD is completely monopolized by foreign companies, and the import of one device is frequently tens of millions of dollars. At present, the cost of manufacturing equipment accounts for about 70% of the cost of power generation for thin-film solar cells. This results in a higher price of photovoltaic electricity than traditional electricity prices, and the bottleneck of its industrialization is very prominent.

Nan Cunhui said that new energy is one of the strategic emerging industries that the country has focused on, and the prospects for the photovoltaic industry are huge, but the key is whether the price of photovoltaic grid-connected electricity can be equal to the traditional electricity price. Mastering core technologies, increasing efficiency, and reducing costs are the keys to the sustainable development of the photovoltaic industry.

Strategic Emerging Industries Need Innovation “Development Model”

The "Decision of the State Council on Accelerating the Cultivation and Development of Strategic Emerging Industries" issued in October 2010 pointed out that strategic emerging industries are an important force to guide future economic and social development. The development of strategic emerging industries has become a major strategy for major countries in the world to seize the commanding heights of a new round of economic and technological development. The "Decision" clarified seven key areas of advanced high-end equipment manufacturing and new energy industries.

Chen Qingtai, a researcher at the Development Research Center of the State Council, said that the main reason for the slowness of China's industrial upgrading is not that the industry is too small, that it is not lacking funds, but that the development model is backward. After entering the transformation and upgrading of the development mode, we must pay special attention to the construction of innovation capabilities, from the keen to scale expansion to focus on the improvement of industrial competitiveness. “We cannot apply past development models to grasp today’s emerging industries. If we cannot extend from the low-end manufacturing to the high-end design, R&D, branding, marketing, and management of the industrial chain, we will never have our own emerging industries.” Say.

Nan Cunhui said that ideal energy can be “snapping off” first, and the reasons can be attributed to various aspects, such as having a first-rate innovation, entrepreneurial team, full implementation of policy funds, private capital and “knowledge capital”, and simultaneously promoting technological innovation and marketization. Application etc. He said that the entry barrier for emerging strategic industries is relatively high, but once breakthroughs are made in key technologies, it will be able to achieve "leaving growth." Therefore, on the one hand, the government needs to provide strong guidance and support, increase capital investment for technology research and development and market cultivation; on the other hand, it also needs to guide and encourage more private capital to participate actively, create a fair competition environment, and eliminate private enterprises. Obstacles to entry.