Jul 8 2008
According to NanoMarkets, a leading industry analyst firm based here, the thin-film photovoltaics (TFPV) market will produce the equivalent of 26 gigawatts (GW) by 2015 and will generate well over $20 billion in revenues in that same time frame. This extraordinary growth rate is due in part to the rapid deployment of photovoltaics of all kinds, but also to the low cost, flexibility and manufacturing advantages associated with TFPV compared with the now dominant crystalline silicon PV. By 2015, NanoMarkets expects that TFPV will account for more than half of the world's production of PV.
NanoMarkets findings are from a soon to be released report, "Thin Film Photovoltaics Markets: 2008 and Beyond" that will be available the week of July 21st. Additional details about the report are available at http://www.nanomarkets.net/. A companion report that addresses manufacturing issues will follow in August of 2008.
Key findings of the report include:
- The recent success of cadmium telluride (CdTe) solar cells is likely to continue and by 2015 NanoMarkets expects that this will be the single largest segment of the TFPV market considered by active material with $8.7 billion in revenues. CdTe has many advantages such as a high optical absorption coefficient and a bandgap that has been described as close to perfect for PV. Also, many of the environmental concerns that have been associated with CdTe in the past seem to be dissipating.
- In spite of higher price points and outstanding manufacturing challenges, CIS/CIGS is still the star of the TFPV world. The technology promises to combine all the advantages of thin film with higher conversion efficiencies approaching those of conventional crystalline PV. NanoMarkets believes that the CIS/CIGS sector will produce almost $5.0 billion in revenues by 2015.
- Because of its low cost, low weight and ability to be fabricated onto flexible substrates TFPV is likely to be highly preferred for residential applications over conventional PV and by 2015 NanoMarkets expects a $2.3 billion market for the residential TF PV market.
About the Report:
TFPV is one of the fastest growing technologies in the whole alternative energy sector and it is creating opportunities for materials firms, solar panel manufacturers and many others. This report analyzes and quantifies these opportunities and identifies where the manufacturing and marketing challenges are. The report addresses all of the segments of the TFPV industry and is the latest in the series of PV reports that have been published by NanoMarkets over the past three years. Coverage includes Amorphous Silicon, CIS/CIGS, CdTe and GaAs. Applications areas covered include utilities, commercial and industrial buildings, residential buildings, consumer electronics, military and aerospace. The report provides detailed forecasts of TFPV broken out by material, and application and discusses the activities of major firms in the TFPV sector including Applied Materials, EPV, FEE, First Solar, Flexcell, Fuji Electric, Global Solar Energy, HelioVolt, Honda, ISET, JNSOLAR, Kaneka, Miasole, Mitsubishi, Nanosolar, Oerlikon, PowerFilm, Sanyo, Schott, Seiko Epson, Sharp, Shell, Solar Cells, Spectrolab, Sulfurcell, Sunset Energietechnik, Tokyo Ohka Kogyo, Uni-Solar and Wurtz.