XsunX is breaking down barriers to mass production of high performance low cost thin film solar products.
XsunX intends to use its TFPV process knowledge to revolutionize the solar industry by combining state-of-the-art, mature magnetic media thin-film manufacturing technologies with proven thin-film photovoltaic processes. This mass production, cross-industry technology breakthrough can increase cell efficiency, improve production speeds and yields, and dramatically lower the cost of thin-film solar cells.
The Need- Attaining Grid Parity
Costs for solar power must be reduced to well below $1 per watt for it to be competitive with grid electricity (grid parity). By rapidly commercializing breakthrough thin-film photovoltaic technology, XsunX strives to provide a true, low-cost sub $1 per watt solution to the industry, while also assisting in bringing about new revenue opportunities for the already mature hard disc drive industry by using its excess manufacturing capacity to mass produce high efficiency, low cost solar cells.
The Problem
The solar industry is relatively new. Growing government mandates and sponsorship is enabling many in the industry to work to establish large scale, low cost solar cell manufacturing capacity. Even though significant investments have been made, in reality compared to other energy sources, solar still requires massive investments to create much-needed solar cell manufacturing infrastructure. Today the power of the sun, without government subsidies, still cannot compete effectively with conventional sources of electrical energy. A more efficient manufacturing process is needed that does not sacrifice the efficiencies of solar cells as these manufacturing systems increase in scale. This new process must:
● Reduce the cost of infrastructure
● Increase per square foot manufacturing facility output
● Break the barriers to large area high efficiency thin film modules
● Leverage existing manufacturing infrastructure to reduce time-to-market
The Solution
Few industries have successfully improved quality and simultaneously reduced costs as effectively as the hard disc drive (HDD) industry. Unfortunately the production of thin film solar cells has been very disappointing as it has failed to deliver the same manufacturing efficiencies as the HDD industry. Global solar module production is still dominated by the production and use of more costly five-inch square silicon wafers. To solve this problem and provide existing silicon wafer users and thin film manufacturers with a high performance, low cost solution, XsunX is combining HDD manufacturing techniques with our customized TFPV processes.
The well-established and very mature hard disc drive industry has enormous magnetic media thin-film manufacturing capacity available to produce massive quantities of hard disc drives. Due to the over-building of manufacturing plants and the downturn of the global economy, the HDD industry is in need of another way to utilize its excess manufacturing capacity. This existing HDD infrastructure represents more than 3 Gigawatts of annual output if hard drive media were replaced with solar cell manufacture.
We at XsunX believe that this it is not only possible, but it is in the best interests of both industries to move forward in combining the two processes. The HDD industry is fully mature and has already proven that it knows how to cost-effectively produce silicon wafers, while the thin-film photovoltaic process is one that most in the industry agree is the best method of manufacturing solar panels. By combining the two, XsunX believes it has the potential to revolutionize the solar industry and make it cost-effective to pursue this method of energy production. And, in so doing XsunX will create a new category of solar manufacturing.