4 replies to this topic

[sunnysky]

http://www.pv-tech.o...gn=newsnow-feed

[Makan]

I am not overly happy about it, as I would prefer if they build new capacity outside China, to become more diversified against tariffs.

[luckygoose]

They will look at it strategely. For the long it will be best to be in china as this is going to be an incredebly big market and the best low cost place to be. Tariffs is a shorter term problem in the world adoption of solar which is an unreversable situation in my opinion. See the different reports of how many gw we are talking about in a few years from now. There will come a time that panels will be short and this will come sooner than a lot of people think.

[odyd]

This announcement was made on Friday by the company. The plan to put only 60MW is very slow start to a big venture. They have complained their cell lines were replaced by the purchases of cell from third parties, due to fire. They said the fire was not significant, but it brought the cost across the entire value chain by 1%  This means cells are so expensive that made a 2% difference from stopped production costs to increase overall average.

 

Practical outcome with 3G of modules today and say 1.66GW of cells by the end of the year, there is no way they can improve on the processing cost at 14.7%. Makan, I agree. Why not to build a cell factory in Indonesia as they apparently had a plan for 60MW modules there but have not heard about for some time? Cell production is automation, so it can be build anywhere. They were so happy to take on the US orders in Canada during the conference but prefer buying extra cost Taiwanese cells for that plant, why not build in Canada? To be honest this low 60MW output is probably the caution, leaving the choice open for another location.

Saying 1.2GW but doing 60MW is not a great sign of confidence in my view  for China's capacity and demand.

[eysteinh]

I agree. Cell is all about wet chemical costs, electricity costs and automation. (if you go for automation that is, you can ofcourse do it manually as well - and most of chemical process are batch not automated meaning one wet etch bench - then manually move to the next etc vs inline meaning on a transport conveyor belt or transported with robotic arms etc.)  Labor is not that big part of the cycle. I think Singapore is a good location as well due to also a hub for solar production and thus easy access to raw goods needed.  

But at-least it is a support of China demand. CSIQ would not built here if not. Granted 60 MW is not the biggest of starts.