News Article
Calyxo Increases CdTe Production To Be Number One
Calyxo GmbH is investing in a second production line with a capacity of 60 MW at Bitterfeld/Wolfen.
Calyxo GmbH currently operates a 25 MWp production line with over 150 employees at the manufacturing plant and will ramp the total capacity at the end of 2012 to 85 MW. The capital for the expansion will be provided by a bank loan and cash contributions from the technology inventor Solar Fields, LLC, who took over ownership of Calyxo GmbH in February 2011 from their former partner Q-Cells SE. Solar Fields invented the technology while a resident at the University of Toledo Incubation Center.
"Based on recent good results in production with modules of 80 Wp and higher we decided to increase the capacity of our the low-cost atmospheric deposition process. We are confident, that Calyxo will reach costs clearly below 0,8 USD/Wp end of 2012 and that a CdTe production in the core of Europe will make sense for our customers", said Dr. Florian Holzapfel, CEO.
The production line will produce the 2011-introduced CX3 product, which was especially designed for hot and humid environments and differentiates substantially from competing CdTe offerings, ensuring long-term stable energy output even under extreme conditions. In these conditions, installation of the same size (MWp or KWp) with the Calyxo technology can provide up to 10% more energy than crystalline installations, driven by the superior temperature behaviour of Calyxo modules. "Recently we have published data showing the excellent performance and stability of the Calyxo product under hot and humid conditions based on our unique laminate design" said Michael Bauer, Calyxo's CTO.
These advances will lead to midterm production costs of less than 0.50 USD/Wp which may be the lowest in the world. Costs this low allow for an LCOE forecast of less than 0.10 USD/KWh for electricity generated by Calyxo PV systems.
Based on current market information, Calyxo is going to be the only meaningful CdTe producer in Europe from 2013 on and offers products to a wide range of customers, from small installers to large Megawatt installations.
Calyxo GmbH, founded in 2005, produces thin-film solar modules based on cadmium telluride (CdTe) technology. After the company split from Q-Cells in February of 2011, the former technology provider Solar Fields took over Calyxo GmbH and invested in a second production line with a capacity of approx. 60 MWp, which will commence production in 2012. Calyxo GmbH currently manufactures a module volume representing an annual power generation capacity of 25 MWp at their production facilities Bitterfeld/Wolfen-Thalheim, in the so-called "Solar Valley" in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. All Calyxo modules are thus "Made and Developed in Germany".
