China Industry: July 6

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Jul. 6 – This is a regular series of relevant industry news from around China.

Solar power
China-based solar cell maker Yingli Green Energy Holding has entered into an agreement to deliver crystalline photovoltaic modules to a 9 megawatt power station in Slovakia in 2009.

Multicrystalline solar wafers manufacturer, LDK Solar, said last week that it passed a milestone in its efforts to reduce production cost by making a 660 kg. multicrystalline silicon ingot. It is the largest ingot produced by the company so far, nearly 47 percent heavier than the standard 450 kg. ingot. The maximum furnace capacity is 800 kg, the company said.

The larger ingots will lower capital expenditure as the increased charge size directly contributes to cut power consumption, increase yields, improve efficiency of downstream processing equipment, and reduce unit consumption of consumables, Dr. Yuepeng Wan from LDK said.

In terms of green investments to help the economy, the European Union lags behind China and the United States. The head of the EU Commission’s environment department, Karl Falkenberg said: “EU states spent three to 13 percent of recovery aid on what we would call green activities.”

He added: “On the U.S. side we come up with about 14 percent… but we see China in the upper 30s.” The EU plans to spend 1.8 percent of gross domestic product, or around EUR 220 billion this year and next, to enhance its economy with green investment being a priority. Last November, China announced a RMB4 trillion economic stimulus package with energy efficiency expected to become a key part of its next five-year development plan from 2011. Under a US$787 billion stimulus plan launched by the United States in February, green projects will receive US$80 billion of spending on transport infrastructure and US$30 billion on energy.

Hong Kong-based GCL-Poly Energy Holdings will buy Chinese solar cell parts manufacturer Jiangsu Zhongneng Polysilicon Technology Development from its owner, GCL-Poly’s chairman, for HKD$26.3 billion. Chinese solar cell maker Astronergy said it had officially launched the first 10 MW phase of a planned 100 MW photovoltaic  power plant in central China’s Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. The completion of the project is expected within three years.

Taiwan-based solar modules maker Auria Solar has brought on stream a 60 MW PV modules plant which uses the Micromorph thin-film silicon technology of Swiss Oerlikon Solar. The Tainan-based facility is the first to reach the mass production stage with Oerlikon Solar’s technology. The Swiss company says its tandem-junction Micromorph process improves solar cell efficiency by up to 50 percent by adding a second microcrystalline absorber to the amorphous silicon layer.

Auria Solar has also obtained the International Electrotechnical Commission certification at TUeV Rheinland. The IEC master certificate will enable Auria Solar’s customers to reduce time-to-market for certified modules to less than six weeks from six months and will be valid worldwide.

Chinese photovoltaic modules maker Suntech Power Holdings will soon  name the location of its maiden U.S. factory, which should be opened in the first quarter of 2010. The plant will have a capacity of 100 MW and give job to some 300 people. Speaking on the sidelines of the Edison Electric Institute’s annual convention in San Francisco closing today, Suntech’s North American sales president, Roger Efird, said the company had picked four potential sites – one on the East Coast and three on the West Coast – and is looking largely for the best economic incentives.

The new facility will assemble solar cells made at the company’s Chinese production unit to save the cost of shipping the heavier complete panels. Suntech follows in the steps of several European and Japanese solar manufacturers that have opened factories in the country over the past year, including Germany’s Schott Solar and SolarWorld as well as Japan’s Sanyo  which said last October it would build a silicon ingot and wafer processing plant in Oregon.

Generous government support has lured other renewable energy businesses as well. Last year BP and Royal Dutch Shell  shelved plans for U.K. wind farms and moved to the other side of the Atlantic instead. According to a report by U.S. industry consultant Solarbuzz published earlier this month, the U.S. solar power market will more than double to over one gigawatt through 2010

Hong Kong-based GCL-Poly Energy Holdings will buy Chinese solar cell parts manufacturer Jiangsu Zhongneng Polysilicon Technology Development  from its owner, GCL-Poly’s chairman, for HK$26.3 billion.

Chinese solar cell maker Astronergy said it had officially launched the first 10 MW phase of a planned 100 MW photovoltaic power plant in central China’s Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. The completion of the project is expected within three years.

Wind power
Li Jianhua, Communist Party Chief of Jiuquan city, Gansu Province said that the city plans to pour some RMB500 billion into wind energy and equipment manufacturing. By 2010, the city is expected to have 5 million KW of wind power installed capacity and 10 million KW by 2015.

This industry report brief is courtesy of Aii Data Processing.