Texas Lands $80 Million Solar Cell Manufacturing Plant

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Austin, which is known as Texas' high-tech city because of companies like Dell Computer Corporation (NASDAQ:DELL) (Round Rock, Texas), Free Semiconductor Incorporated (Austin), Samsung Semiconductor (San Jose, California) and Advanced Micro Devices (NYSE:AMD) (Sunnyvale, California) either headquartered or having substation manufacturing operations located near the city. Austin can now also count solar cell manufacturer HelioVolt Corporation as another high-tech manufacturer to open a plant in the city. The 6-year-old company is in the process of preparing to build its first commercial scale plant in Austin.

HelioVolt's $80 million plant will have an initial production capacity of 20 megawatts worth of solar cells each year. The company is leasing a 122,400-square-foot building known as Expo 8 that Trammel Crow Company (Dallas, Texas) recently completed in the Expo Business Park. HelioVolt has also retained the services of Austin-based architect and general contractor TAG International LLP and Harvey-Cleary Engineers and Builders for interior fit out, changes to electrical service and installation of a customized HVAC system. Building renovations are expected to begin in two to three months with equipment installations following approximately four to six weeks later. The plant is expected to come online in late third quarter or early fourth quarter of 2008.

Unlike traditional solar cells, the cells will not be made of silicon, which is currently in high demand with limited supply, making it expensive. HelioVolt's cells will be made of copper indium gallium selenide (CIGS), which will lower material cost but also lowers the cell's efficiency. Currently, no other cell is as efficient as the ones made with silicon in converting sunlight into electricity, which has been the challenge for companies such as HelioVolt and others who utilize CIGS as the basis for their cells. The market is willing to accept cells that are not as efficient as long as their cost is significantly lower than the highly efficient silicon cells.

The company hopes that its thin-film panel proprietary FASST technology will make solar technology affordable on a mass scale. HelioVolt states that its "printing" production process is 10 to 100 times faster than current processes and the thin film is 100 times thinner than traditional silicon. The thin film panels have the potential to be incorporated into building materials and architecturally incorporated into buildings.

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