Spire Corporation (Bedford, Massachusetts), a global solar company providing capital equipment and turnkey production lines to manufacture photovoltaic (PV) cells and modules, in January 2010 announced that its wholly owned subsidiary, Spire Semiconductor, LLC had successfully completed Phase I of its "High Efficiency Concentrator Solar Cell" program with the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). According to the press release, NREL also notified the company that it will authorize Phase II of the program.

Under the 18-month, 3.7 million US-dollar cost share subcontract, Spire Semiconductor is to develop a technology to cost-effectively manufacture 500 sun concentrator solar cells with an efficiency of 42 % for concentrating photovoltaic (CPV) systems.

NREL supports development of GaAs CPV solar cells

According to the press release, Spire Semiconductor passed through the NREL's "Stage Gate Review", a yes or no decision process to validate the progression of the project and to assure that it meets contract objectives. These objectives include estimates of key performance parameters of competitive Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE), annual manufacturing capacity potential, direct manufacturing cost, and cell Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF). Spire reports that it had achieved PV cell performances of greater than 39 % efficiency during Phase I of the project. "We are very happy to be given the go ahead with our program", said Roger G. Little, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Spire Corporation. "It validates our efforts toward developing a proprietary gallium arsenide (GaAs) concentrator solar cell that exceeds anything commercially available." Little expects the PV industry to continue to grow significantly during 2010.

Spire Semiconductor, LLC awarded over 2 million US-dollars from DOE's Manufacturing Tax Credit program

Spire also announced that Spire Semiconductor had received confirmation from the Department of Energy (DOE) that its application has been approved under the Advanced Energy Manufacturing Tax Credit (AMTC) program. According to the press release, DOE approved the allocation of over 2 million US-dollars to expand the company's III/V compound semiconductor foundry facility in Hudson, New Hampshire. "Spire Semiconductor being awarded over 2 million US-dollars in tax credits for its path of commercialization of our concentrator photovoltaic technology could not have come at a better time", said Little, referring to the previously announced approval of Phase II by NREL. "With the PV industry continuously growing, the availability of this tax credit will allow us to grow along with it", Little said. "This opportunity will allow us to establish a state-of-the-art commercial manufacturing line to produce our proprietary triple junction high efficiency cells and support our growing CPV customers."

2010-01-20 | Courtesy: Spire Corporation | solarserver.com © Heindl Server GmbH