Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - PVFINAL (Photo Voltaic Fully Integrated and Automated Line)

Teaser

The following actions have been undertaken:• Definition of the Work Team of key professionals for the PVFINAL project support and exploitation• A program of four workshops has been specified• Plan of meetings for potential partnerships during the Phase 1 and the possible...

Summary

The following actions have been undertaken:
• Definition of the Work Team of key professionals for the PVFINAL project support and exploitation
• A program of four workshops has been specified
• Plan of meetings for potential partnerships during the Phase 1 and the possible Phase 2
• Market research carried out via secondary desk based research into the market size, demand, etc. and primary research via an online survey with potential users of the product.
• An overview of the work done in the last six months and of the achieved results has been made on 28/12/2015. The conclusion of the project is still foreseen on 31/12/2015
• An evaluation of the Technical Feasibility has been carried out
• An assessment of the Economic Feasibility has been performed
• Other key feasibility aspects have been appraised
• The Market Feasibility Study has been completed
• IP exploration & dissemination aspects have been evaluated
• The Business Plan has been completed

Work performed

1. 1. Definition of the Work team. On 1st July 2015 the project team was formed:
• Vittore De Leonibus, Project Manager
• Alessio Menna, Head Designer
• Mariano Fabiani, Lamination Technology Specialist
• Ciro Paudice, Glass and Glazing Technology Specialist


2. Workshops :
Workshops :
On 14th July 2015 a first workshop was held for the preparation of the Business Plan. Three additional workshops followed, with an approx. interval of 6 weeks. A commercial viability study was planned. During the Workshop we identified the company Inventya Ltd to work with Teknisolar for the assessment of the commercial viability and perform additional market research.
a. Workshop 2 was carried out via a teleconference on 27th October to discuss the Business Plan progress and review the questionnaire and contact database for use in the primary research.
b. Workshop 3 took place via teleconference w/c 23/11/15 to review the findings of the Commercial Viability study and the progression of the final Business Plan.
c. Workshop 4 has taken place via a teleconference on 15th December to finalise the feasibility study (technical, economic) before submission.
Additional meetings and communications have taken place between these milestone workshops.

3. Meetings for potential partnerships.
a. A meeting was held in Carmignano di Brenta with the Megacell Group that had previously anticipated their interest to participate to Phase 1, contributing and confirming the feasibility study, and to the possible Phase 2 for the interest to acquire a 90 MW plant. During Phase 2 Mega Group will be contributing with several technology services and key special products during the expected 2 years of the project.
b. A number of meetings has been held in UK and by phone conference with Fuel Save Limited, a company based in the North West of England, that is interested in establishing a world class manufacturing PV plant in the North of England, using Teknisolar technologies and equipment.
As a result of the above meetings, phone conversations and conference calls held during the six months period, Megacell has confirmed the agreement to consider them as a partner of Teknisolar during next phase 2 of this project. More in particular Megacell has expressed the interest in partnering with Teknisolar and in establishing a JV for the installation and exploitation of the prototype Solar Field which will be built in the final phase of the project, using the panels made on the manufacturing line. The prototype solar field will act as a demonstrator of the project’s success to achieve energy prices close to, or better than, the current LCOE for fossil fuel power plants.
Fuel Save Ltd has confirmed the interest to a possible acquisition of a PV panels manufacturing line, fully integrated and fully automated.

4. Market Research
a. secondary research has been carried out identifying the following:
• Overview of the market, its size and structure, and potential demand.
• Competitor analysis
• Potential customers and partners profiling.
• Business Model & Revenue Streams
b. primary research has been carried out in the form of an online survey which was sent to prospective users of the Teknisolar technology to provide consumer insight which will further inform the Business Plan.
c. the information collated through the research has then been analysed and used to inform the business plan, particularly:
• Competitive edge/USP analysis
• SWOT & PESTLE analysis
• Commercialisation and Exploitation Plan
• Definition of the design principles for the Phase 2 manufacturing plant, feasibility assessment, cost evaluation.

Final results

Technical Feasibility

During the past six months, key technologies have been identified, among those studied and tested by Teknisolar in the past five years, as realistically applicable to build the first fully automated PV assembly line, with no in-process batch operations or need for human intervention, using many of Teknisolar proprietary and patented or patentable know-how.
Several test programmes took place to:
• Improve the performance of the laminator, by means of new and innovative pressing and curing systems
• Study the manufacturing cycle in order to optimise it to the minimum possible time.
• Upgrade the R&D laminator with the new design and findings.
• Cooperate with Megacell to assess the valid use of BiSon and IBC cells with our technology
• Verify the quality of the PV panels produced on the upgraded R&D line
The potential impact of the work done during the six months period will be:
• Innovative, highly automatic, low cost manufacturing of solar panels
• High adhesion of panel layers and no ‘edge-pinching’ effects, no wrinkles, voids, breakages, bubbles in the manufactured solar panels, leading to extended solar panels life to over 40 years (confirmed by means of accelerated ageing tests).
• No visible cosmetic defects on products.
• Use of advanced BiSoN and IBC solar cells, which will allow for high efficiency generation of electrical energy, well over current limits. The use of each of these newly developed solar cells and the potential combination of both technologies, will allow producing low cost mono- crystalline panels of up to 350 Wp.
The fundamental Teknisolar technology is represented by the high performance new Multi-stage Membrane-less Laminator called “Robostak Generation IV”. At the end of the present semester Teknisolar filed a new patent application (Application N. 102015000082473 filed on 11/12/2015, CCIAA: Milan, Italy). A previous patent application on the same subject had been filed in December 2014 (Application number: MI2014A002113 filed 10/12/2014, CCIAA: Milan, Italy).
Other key technologies evaluated for their possible use in the next project phases are:
o Glass tempering line – for a complete manufacturing integration starting from the raw glass panes.
o Multi-stringer – The process speed is up to 5400 cells/hour. Teknisolar are not aware of stringers in the market having such production capacity and productivity.
o Automatic soldering of bus bars and ribbons – Soldering equipment with simple construction criteria and low capital cost.
o Automatic lay-up system – High efficiency layup system, fully designed and tested by Teknisolar.
o Automatic application of the Junction Box – A specially designed junction box with the highest water ingress protection (grade of protection: IP68) and suitable for application onto the panel without any manual intervention.
o Panel manufacturing based on “BiSoN” cells (Bifacial Solar cells based on monocrystalline on N-Type silicon cells) and “IBC” cells Interdigitated Back Contact Solar Cells.

Economic Feasibility

Teknisolar’s PV panel manufacturing lines will allow clients to produce highly efficient photovoltaic modules. The PV panels will be less expensive and at least 20% more efficient than the average currently on the market. Furthermore, the longevity of the panels manufactured on our lines will be at least double (40 years and even 50 years) than that of existing panels.
The panels manufactured on Teknisolar’s lines, when deployed on large scale, e.g. solar farm/field, will overpass the grid parity barrier and, crucially, will not require the support of a feed-in tariff mechanism to achieve parity.
In brief, the high quality and low cost solar panels manufactured on the new line will contribute to decarbonise and make the European energy system more efficient in a sustainable way.

Other key feasibility aspects

Other Key feasibility aspects to achieve the project’s target will inclu

Website & more info

More info: http://www.teknisolar.com.