EnergyTrend: Analysis on the Concentrating PV System Market

Solar power plant project is divided into two main types of technology, one photoelectric conversion, and the other is solar thermal conversion. Concentrated solar thermal power (CSP) technology creates steam and makes solar thermal generators to produce electricity; the principle of optical focus concentrating photovoltaic conversion of solar system (concentrating PV system; CPV) is to use the lens to focus the sun's rays refracted or reflected on the solar cell to generate electricity.

Concentrating PV system combines solar concentrator system, optical system and solar tracker. The main material used is gallium arsenide (GaAs), which can absorb over a broad spectrum of solar energy through a multi-junction compound semiconductor. The current technology development comprises three junction InGaP / GaAs / Ge concentrator solar cells, whose conversion efficiency can be greatly increased. The average cell conversion efficiency comes as high as between 36% and 42%, 22%~25% remains after modulization, compared with that of multi-Si / mono-Si cells (14% ~ 18%) or thin-film battery (10% ~ 15%).

Moreover, heat resistance of CPV is higher than that of silicon solar cell. However, CPV needs to use solar tracker with dual-axis, with error tolerance of only within 0.5 degrees. Therefore, it is only operated in areas with high temperature, dry climate condition and sufficient sun light. Recently, the adoption of CPV is in demonstrated in south Europe, the Middle East, China, India, Africa and the United States for solar power plants. EnergyTrend believes that CPV has great market potential in the future.

As the technical capacity advances, with progressive optical and electrical professional training and policy support, manufacturers indicated that they are very optimistic about the CPV future development. CPV can start mass production stage after the enhancement of production yield and after solving the processing bottleneck.

It is expected that the worldwide CPV new installation volume will reach 1GW in five years. EnergyTrend conducted a series of the CPV analysis based on the CPV cost structure and the supply chain development.

Table of Contents：

The Latest Report Technical Analysis CSP Overview CPV Technological Features CPV Market Overview System Components CSP Industry Development CPV Component Cost Analysis CPV Supply Chain Srategic Positioning Strategies of Global Leading CPV Companies Strategies of Taiwanese CPV Related Manufacturers Conclusion Technological Advancement Readiness of Related Industries Development of End Markets Next Stage: Mass Production

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Joanne Wu   
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Ted Lai   
+886-2-77026888 ext. 673    TedLai@TrendForce.com