The Current Status of CPV 2013

While the concentrated photovoltaic industry continues its
progression, with more megawatts installed than ever, there are still
questions surrounding the technology. Through a series of articles
and contributions PV Insider analyze the present status and future
prospects of CPV in this free guide.
The guide was compiled to mark the launch of CPV USA 2013, the
5th
Concentrated Photovoltaic Summit USA (23-24 September, San Jose,
CA). The conference is the biggest CPV focused conference in the USA this
year, showing you how to reduce costs through technical innovation and
optimized balance of systems to prove the viability of your CPV business.
The Current
Status of CPV 2013
CoverimagecourtesyofSolariaCorporation
Find out more about the conference at www.pv-insider.com/cpv2013

The Current Status of CPV 2013
Contents
3 CPV battles to become the PV technology
with the lowest LCOE - PV Insider article
5 CPV in the age of inexpensive PV - SPV
Market Research
6 Testing and simulation - Q&A with Alpha
Omega Power Technologies
8 Innovation within Solar Power: From Beautiful
Simplicity to High-Performance Complexity -
Sandia National Laboratories
9 Expansion and bankability need to go hand in
hand for CPV - PV Insider article
www.pv-insider.com/cpv • 2

www.pv-insider.com/cpv2013 • 3
CPV battles to become the PV
technology with the lowest LCOE
The CPV sector has made slow progress over the past
12 months, but the period has been marked by a number
of positive outcomes. CPV is gaining competitiveness in
regions with high direct normal irradiation (DNI). The recent
announcements of utility-scale CPV power plants prove that.
Soitec, for example, is in the middle of the construction
phase of a 44 MW CPV power plant in Touwsrivier, South
Africa. In the U. S., the company has projects with signed
PPAs of about 300 MW in the pipeline.
This, as Soitec believes, shows that CPV is a matured
technology, and it is ready for utility-scale deployment.
“It shows that the CPV market is taking off,” says Hansjörg
Lerchenmüller, Senior Vice President Product Strategy of
Soitec Solar Division.
In addition to Soitec’s 44 MW project in South Africa getting
signed and financed with modules already being deployed,
there are a couple of other key developments, too – the
Cogentrix 30 MW commissioning of modules produced by
Amonix achieving power production at or above contract
agreements, and Suncore’s commissioning of a 50 MW
power plant in Golmud, China.
“These are huge achievements and bode well for future
deployments of CPV with the data produced by these
installations loosening the purse strings of financiers who
have been unwilling to finance new technologies to date,”
says Jeff Allen, Vice President of business development at
Solar Junction.
Rising Up To the Real Challenge
CPV can only use DNI to generate electricity and hence
can only compete with other PV technologies in regions
where the share of DNI is significant in the total irradiation,
points out Nikolai Dobrott, Managing Partner, Apricum –
The Cleantech Advisory.
“But, importantly, one must not conclude that CPV
is automatically competitive in high-DNI regions, as
standard PV technologies can of course also use DNI
to convert sunlight into electricity. So the key question
is whether CPV systems can be installed at a capital
cost that can compete with standard PV systems and
only then they can deliver lower LCOE than standard
systems,” says Dobrott.
“The problem gets exacerbated by the perceived lack
of bankability of CPV, which drives up cost of financing
and hence LCOE. These issues translate into the difficult
task for CPV companies of designing systems with very
low material usage, low technical complexity and easy
manufacturability that are at the same time very efficient
and very robust, together with a smart and capital-efficient
strategy to establish a track record and thus bankability.”
For their part, CPV companies are making progress. As
Allen points out, continued reductions in system’s prices
combined further increases in module performance leads
to a pathway for CPV to become the PV technology with
the lowest LCOE.
“CPV companies are reducing prices and achieving
fantastic advances in module-level efficiency,” he says.
He adds examples of companies gaining in competitive
attributes are most exemplified by deployments, referring
to Soitec Solar and Suncore Photovoltaics. “Additionally,
both companies are building on successes of last year
with a pipeline of much larger business opportunities for
the current year.”
The CPV sector is eyeing Soitec with its large pipeline, which has the unique op-
portunity to address the cost issue with economies of scale required to lower the
cost for installing and maintaining such systems.
Ritesh Gupta, PV Insider
"One must not conclude that CPV
is automatically competitive in
high-DNI regions, as standard PV
technologies can of course also
use DNI to convert sunlight into
electricity."

Trump Card - Efficiency
CPV is the photovoltaic technology with the “highest
efficiencies”, says Lerchenmüller.
“Efficiency is a major lever on the costs applied to
the module size. CPV modules achieve efficiencies
of around 30%. This is about twice the efficiency of
conventional silicon PV modules,” he says. “CPV also
allows a cost-efficient use of solar cells, one of the
main cost drivers in a module. The CPV technology
uses optics to concentrate the sunlight by a factor of
500 to 1000 and focuses it onto the solar cells, which
are reduced to a small fraction of the CPV module.
That makes a cost-efficient use of highly-efficient
multi-junction solar cells possible.”
Also, multi-junction solar cells have a huge potential for
further efficiency increases, which will also increase the
competitiveness of CPV.
“As the CPV market is taking off, bulk purchasing also
allows to significantly reducing the components prices
of CPV systems. In high DNI regions, as regards to the
electricity generation cost, CPV can already keep up with
conventional PV, even with aggressive module pricing as
recently seen in the market. The growth of the CPV market
will further improve economies of scale and will increase
the competitiveness of CPV,” says Lerchenmüller.
For his part, Allen points out that a couple of years ago most
companies departed the 500 suns paradigm in favour of
moving to approximately 1000 suns concentration.
He says concentration is a huge lever to reduce LCOE as
long as the componentry does not dramatically increase –
which is typically the case. Some companies are pushing
concentration beyond 1000 suns typically up to 1500
suns which is the upper limit typically due to the added
cost of trackers and management of tracking.
“CPV is a relatively immature technology as compared to
other PV technologies, therefore, the traditional learning
curve of for every doubling of output a 20% cost reduction
is gained. This is fine, but it may be difficult to grow
capacity so quickly for some of these vendors, therefore,
increased concentration / efficiency are key pathways to
LCOE reductions,” Allen says.
At the same time, there is a practical limit on concentration
increase. Therefore, increased efficiency resulting in higher
energy generation has an additive benefit which impacts
the entire solar farm including the number of poles,
trackers, modules, concrete and wiring. “Therefore, this is
a very significant benefit,” says Allen.
Consolidation Days
A number of significant setbacks, as Allen explains, have
happened over the past 12 months including the following:
 Closure of GreenVolts – this was driven by the decision
by ABB to not complete an investment agreement; ABB
was having difficulty competing against lower cost PV
for their flat-plate PV projects. This was not a reflection
on GreenVolts itself, but a more strategic decision by
ABB to exit solar projects and just sell either traditional
electrical project products.
 Siemens – Siemens initially invested in Semprius;
Siemenshadpreviouslyinvestedinitswinddevelopment,
concentrated solar thermal and flat projects, which were
performing quite poorly compounded with economic
issues within the entire corporation. Therefore, it was
decided to restructure their renewables portfolio and,
unfortunately, a decision was made to sell off various
assets including the investment in Semprius. Siemens
had been the primary international partner for driving
Semprius’ pipeline and originally would have been the
eventual acquirer.
 SolFocus – while SolFocus was making progress over
the last 12 months announcing a large first tranche of
a greater 450 MW project in Mexico, no different than
other large PV projects numerous delays occurred
while the investor base became tired; a few months ago
SolFocus was put up for sale.
The difficulties of the market are part of the natural
consolidation that was fully anticipated in the market.
Unfortunately, the extremely low cost for panels from China
have accelerated the consolidation, which has resulted in
an extremely painful period.
Referring to the setbacks for the industry with even
industry leaders like Amonix and SolFocus closing their
plants and reducing their staff, Dobrott says: “If we take
the amount of start-up capital already consumed by each
of these companies as a benchmark for what is minimally
required, it becomes clear that unfortunately there are yet
more companies with whom investors will lose patience
and will simply cut their losses.”
CPV has the potential to deliver on lower LCOE along with
some other advantages like lower land requirement, but
so far cost for it has been prohibitively high to make it
competitive with standard PV.
Soitec with its large pipeline has the unique opportunity to
address the cost issue with economies of scale required to
lower the cost for installing and maintaining such systems.
Frankly, the entire industry’s future depends greatly on how
these large-scale plants will perform, concludes Dobrott.

CPV in the Age of Inexpensive PV
Paula Mints, SPV Market Research
Inexpensive photovoltaic modules may be encouraging a
boom in the deployment of PV systems, but these low
module prices are casting a pall on sister solar technology
sectors, CPV (both low and high) and CSP in terms of
price competition.
Unfortunately, low ASPs for PV modules do not
appropriately reflect manufacturing costs, a fact on clear
display in the gross margins for public PV manufacturers.
In 2012 the average gross margin for all PV cell and module
manufacturers (those developing the semiconductor
technology) was -6.23%, with the average operating
margin was -19%. 2013 is likely to be an easier year for
c-Si manufacturers to earn positive margins as the price of
polysilicon is currently in the range of $15 to $17/kilogram,
a price that is approximately half the cost of production.
This will allow c-Si manufacturers to potentially avoid both
price reductions and hold prices steady while polysilicon
manufacturers bear the brunt of PV industry downward
price pressure.
CPV manufacturers must compete in what could be termed
a hostile market with inexpensive c-Si systems that, when
tracked, come close to the commercial efficiency of CPV
systems.
Failures of thin film PV manufacturers, c-Si PV
manufacturers, some developers as well as balance of
system manufacturers (SatCon for example) have led to
a crisis of confidence among investors. As long time PV
industry players and former leaders continue with negative
margins and failure, questions of warranty viability have
come to the fore. A technology sector that appears to be
out of the mainstream (though the same could be said of
all solar technologies) faces the trifecta of shaken investor
confidence, tough pricing competition as well as a lack of
understanding about CPV technologies and history.
Soitec, which has seen delays in its multi-megawatt
project in South Africa, finalized its 1-Billion Rand,
USD $110.8-million (1 ZAR = 0.110805 USD, 1 USD
= 9.02487 ZAR), which will be used towards installing
the 44-MWp system. Assuming, based on the loan
amount, a system cost of $2.52/Wp, when installed
the system price would be competitive – assuming,
that is, that this is the total project funding. Should
the system perform as expected, or, outperform, this
should alleviate at least some concerns about the
sector. For CPV, expected performance is likely not
sufficient, for better or worse CPV installations need
to outperform.
At a conference in December 2012, Amonix reported
that performance data from its 30-MWp HCPV system in
Alamosa, Colorado indicates that the system is producing
at 110%. Continued positive performance data from
deployed HCPV and LCPV might assuage investor anxiety.
Figure 1 offers a revised HCPV forecast to 2016. The
forecast takes into account current industry realities
including investor confidence as well as competing
technologies such as inexpensive PV. The conservative
forecast has the highest probability.
Figure 2: HCPV Revised Forecast, to 2016
This piece is taken from the SPV Market Re-
search bi-monthly newsletter ‘Solar Flare’.
For more information, visit paulaspv.com
2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
■ 0.7 9.5 2.8 5.0 11.2 62.0 68.8 60.2 118.0 132.0 122.9
■ 110.3 177.0 247.5 315.9
■ 150.5 295.0 396.0 544.1
■ HCPV history & low forecast
■ HCPV conservative forecast
■ HCPV accelerated forecast
600
500
400
300
200
100
0

Testing and simulation
Alpha-Omega Power Technologies
1) Please give an introduction to the company
and your CPV activities
Alpha-Omega Power Technologies, LLC (AOPT) was
started in 1997 and has been producing production
level pulsed solar simulators for the CPV market since
2003. In 2003 AOPT work with an industry leader in CPV
technology to develop a state of the art pulsed solar
simulator for production testing. Since that time, AOPT
has worked with many CPV companies to refine our
product. Today, AOPT offers a family of solar simulators
for the very demanding aerospace industry and a full
range of test systems for all levels of terrestrial CPV
manufacturing. AOPT is now a world leader in supplying
solar simulators for wafers, cells, receivers and large
module testing of CPV products.
2) Why are solar simulators so important to CPV’s
future?
The best scientists and engineers developing innovative
new technologies are only as good as the tools they have
to provide the data needed to make decisions on product
design and process changes. A good solar simulator
with precise measurement capability is one of the most
critical tools needed to provide this data during product
innovation, development and production.
CPV companies need commercial simulators to take
advantage of the many benefits they can offer. Having
an independent company dedicated to the future of
the test system product line provides more features,
continuous improvement, support and stability than an
in-house engineer can offer on a project. AOPT builds
many simulators for many companies and has worked
out the operational details with a diverse range of
operators and scientists scrutinizing the operation and
data. In this competitive market, the time to market is
critical. This emphasizes the need for the high-quality
data to be available for evaluation at every stage of the
development cycle.
Achieving the highest level of performance and
efficiency from a CPV product requires a simulator
that can accurately measure variations as process and
design changes are made. This means a simulator must
have a tightly matched and repeatable spectrum, high
intensity and flat uniformity. International standards
classify solar simulators in three classes for the primary
characteristics of spectral match, non-uniformity and
stability. The Class A spectrum match defined for PV
is insufficient for tests of triple junction cells at 25%.
AOPT simulators are designed for 1%. Simulators
utilizing traceable references assure the manufacturer
and end user of an accurate and verifiable measure of
the device performance. AOPT simulators utilize up to
4 reference inputs.
In summary, consistently producing good products
requires a controlled process and to control a process
it must be monitored. The days of taking modules to
the parking lot for testing on apparently clear days are
gone. To instill the market’s confidence in CPV products,
it is necessary to provide the assurance that the
manufacturer has the monitoring and controls in place
to sustain a high volume production that will consistently
meet their stringent requirements. 100% testing of CPV
devices with solar simulators, that perform on the levels
mentioned, is essential to develop and produce the
quality and reliability of products the industry demands.
Interview with Joe Schneider, Business Development Manager,
Alpha-Omega Power Technologies

3) What impact can testing/monitoring have on
CPV’s cost reduction potential?
Solar simulators have a cost impact throughout the
CPV development and manufacturing process. Solar
companies need to be able to focus their resources
on their core competency, developing CPV products.
A very good solar simulator with powerful software and
data collection can be one of the best investments these
companies could make.
Another way companies try to control costs is by
minimizing or eliminating testing at some critical points in
their manufacturing. The cost savings of finding product
defects as early in the manufacturing cycle as possible
is significant. The cost can easily increase by an order
of magnitude at each subsequent process step when
defective parts move to the next level of assembly before
being detected. The accumulating costs of labor, rework,
and scrap pale when compared to customers finding
defects and damaging the reputation and brand of the
company.
Between cell manufacturing and completed module
assembly, multiple companies may be involved. AOPT
high intensity solar test systems provide the ability to
test at several stages such as wafer, cell and receiver or
mounted cells. Different modes are available to test larger
areas such as large receivers, receivers with secondary
optics, arrays or modules usually at lower intensities.
CPV manufacturers that use simulators in various stages
of manufacturing from the same family of products can
save on operator and maintenance training, spare parts
and the reduced labor of correlating test equipment
measurements.
The productivity of a solar simulator is determined by the
number of systems needed and can vary significantly
depending on the equipment. AOPT simulators can
test 240 or more cells per minute. The limitation of
testing on this type of high speed system is the rate that
devices can be handled by the automation equipment.
Other important characteristics of solar simulators
that impact manufacturing and product cost are the
time and ease of calibration, correlation of multiple
systems, repeatable performance and reliability of the
equipment.
4) What in your opinion is the biggest challenge
facing the CPV industry today?
CPV designers continue to push for higher efficiencies
and lower cost to compete with other energy sources.
The solar simulator can play an important role in both
those areas. New technology multi-junction cells are
being developed with four and more junctions. These
devices will require new testing capabilities to support the
development and production of these higher efficiency
products. And to keep the cost of these new CPV
products at a minimum the solar simulators will need
to have an upgrade path to maximize the capital return
on investment. AOPT is involved with CPV companies
now developing the next generation products and will
continue to support them as they strive to overcome
todays and future CPV challenges.
5) What can the industry do to encourage the
technology’s market acceptance?
Market acceptance is determined by customers
seeing a better ROI for CPV than other technologies.
ROI is more than the initial cost. It is heavily dependent
on reputation developed for quality and longevity.
The industry needs to continue to demonstrate its’
persistence in meeting these high standards. One way
CPV companies can demonstrate this commitment is
by using the best manufacturing practices and testing
tools available. AOPT is committed to providing the
manufactures with the best CPV test tools to meet
these standards.
6) What are your expectations for the technology
in the next 12 months?
The CPV industry is competing in a changing market
with companies coming in and out of the business
every year. During the last couple years more seem to
be going out than in. This trend is expected to continue
as the industry matures and grows substantially in the
next 12 months. New geographic markets such as
MENA are growing rapidly and investing in technology
and manufacturing facilities. New higher efficiency
cells will move from R&D to volume manufacturing and
CPV will continue to become more completive in high
DNI geographies.
Joe Schneider is Business
Development Manager at Alpha-Omega
Technologies. At CPV USA 2013, Joe
will be discussing the role of test data in
productivity, efficiency, quality, cost and
market acceptance.
See more at
www.pv-insider.com/cpv2013

Innovation within Solar Power: From Beautiful
Simplicity to High-Performance Complexity
Gregory N. Nielson, PhD, Sandia National Laboratories
The beauty of wafer silicon PV technology is its simplicity.
This simplicity has allowed wafer silicon PV to dominate
the PV industry. However, the simplicity also significantly
limits its future potential. Commercial wafer silicon cells
and modules are already available that are very near
the practical limit of conversion efficiency of silicon.
Furthermore, the manufacturing cost component of wafer
silicon modules have been driven down to the point where
the modules are now highly dominated by materials costs
(which are much more difficult to fundamentally reduce).
Given these limits, “disruptive” reductions of LCOE for
solar power are more likely to come from technologies that
have the potential for significantly improved performance,
such as concentrated photovoltaics (CPV).
At Sandia National Laboratories, we are working on a new
vision for CPV that has the potential to provide enhanced
capabilities and performance that will lead to reduced $/
Wpeak costs. This vision takes advantage of technology
and infrastructure from microsystem industries (e.g., IC,
MEMS, LED, etc.). These industries have matured over the
course of decades and are now a more than $300B per year
industry. Fundamentally, microsystem industries succeed
by taking advantage of beneficial scaling effects where new
functionality, better performance, or lower costs are achieved
by making some component of the system very small.
This path to differentiated performance and cost through
fundamental scaling effects is exactly what we are trying to
replicate in solar power.
Within PV there are a significant number of beneficial scaling
effects that come into play as solar cells are reduced to the
micro-scale. To take advantage of these scaling effects, we
are exploring micro-concentrator PV modules with cell sizes
down to approximately 100 microns across. This approach
allows very significant benefits such as concentrator module
thicknesses comparable to flat plate PV modules (~1 cm)
with concentration factors up to 400X. These systems use
sophisticated (but inexpensive) refractive optics that provide
a relatively wide collection angle of at least ±2° and an
optical efficiency of >90% of direct illumination. The wide
acceptance angle, combined with the thin form factor, allows
the modules to be mounted on existing low-cost, coarse
two-axis trackers currently used for flat-plate modules.
Interestingly, the system level scale benefits don’t end
there. By using large numbers of very small solar cells it
is possible to create passive interconnect networks within
the module that provide intrinsic shade tolerance, high-
voltage output directly from the module, and robustness
to module damage such as electrical opens or shorts that
would completely cripple current modules. Also, due to the
large number of cells and the high-voltage capability of the
module, new architectures for module-integrated 3-phase
inverters are possible that significantly reduce the size and
number of discrete components required, reducing size
and cost while increasing inverter lifetime and performance.
Additional scale benefits are present at the cell level also.
Micro-scale cells have significantly higher heat transfer
capabilities compared to large cells due to the much
larger surface area to volume ratio of the micro-scale cells,
which allows simple heat management systems and low
operating temperatures. Small-dimensioned cells release in
tens of minutes using Epitaxial Lift-off (ELO - for wafer reuse
cost savings) as compared to full wafer ELO which can
take tens of hours. Micro-scale cells can have all metal lines
removed from the optical aperture of the cell, eliminating
shading losses. Finally, small-scale cells lend themselves to
“3D Integration” techniques from the IC industry that can
eliminate constraints on both lattice matching and current/
spectrum matching for multijunction solar cells, allowing
the possibility of even higher conversion efficiencies as
compared to today’s highest performing cells.
Taken together, these fundamental scaling effects can provide
dramatic improvements in performance and reductions in
cost. Cost modeling indicates that this type of system would
be capable of providing system costs significantly less than
today’s PV systems (without any subsidies) due to the high-
performance and low-cost nature of the module combined
with the low-cost BOS costs resulting from the flat-plate
BOS systems used. Furthermore, given the form factor of
the module and system, distributed, commercial rooftop
generation is possible allowing the system to compete
(favorably) with retail grid power prices.
If the cost and performance potential of this type of system is
realized, the solar industry will move from the simple beauty
of wafer silicon PV to a more complicated, high-performance
CPV solution. It is interesting to step back and consider that
in almost all applications of technology that have importance
in society, the evolution of the technology has been from
simple early solutions to more complex solutions that
provide greater performance and/or functionality at a lower
fundamental cost level. This has been seen in computers,
automobiles, telephones, recorded music players, airplanes,
etc., and will very likely be seen in solar power as well.

Acceptance and hold-ups, expansions and closures are
all part and parcel of any renewable energy technology’s
journey.
CPV, as an upcoming solar technology, has had its share
of ups and downs in the last year or so, but those entities
that are expanding, definitely promise to take the sector
to a new level.
It is acknowledged that CPV has struggled lately due
to fast price decline for standard PV panels. The key
miscalculation of CPV players has been that they skated
where the focus (i.e., cost of PV panels) has been,
rather than where it is going to be. Together with the
lack of bankability, this has led to only a very low market
penetration of CPV so far, says Nikolai Dobrott, managing
partner, Apricum – The Cleantech Advisory.
“However, we expect that PV pricing will more or less
plateau short- to mid-term, which may give CPV players
the unique opportunity to gain market share, but only if
they reach the very demanding price points necessary and
if they crack the bankability issue,” says Dobrott.
Emergence of New Markets
Another unique opportunity is currently provided by the
emergence of markets in the Middle East, such as Saudi
Arabia, where CPV could not only benefit from high direct
solar irradiation, but also from the potential to localise
manufacturing.
“In any case, it will definitely continue to be a tough
battle for the CPV industry, with many companies yet to
go out of business. Among all players, we are looking
with particular interest at what Soitec is doing, which has
many large-scale projects in the pipeline, has reached
some economies of scale in manufacturing, and has
sufficient corporate backing to finance its market entry,”
says Dobrott.
"We have CPV installations worldwide in 14 countries at
Expansion and bankability need to go
hand in hand for CPV
As the CPV sector comes to grips with a slowdown in the US and Europe, it sees
the expediency required to get pilot systems on the ground in markets such as
Saudi Arabia, South Africa and China to strengthen its bankability.
Ritesh Gupta, PV Insider
the moment and we are expecting a significant growth
of the CPV market in several high DNI regions,” Hansjörg
Lerchenmüller, Senior Vice President Product Strategy of
Soitec Solar Division
For its part, Soitec emphatically states that it is expanding
its CPV business. The company recently finalised a $108m
bond for its 44MW Touwsrivier project in South Africa. This
is the first publicly-listed project bond ever issued to finance
a solar power plant based on CPV technology.
“In the US, we have a project pipeline of 300 MW with
signed PPAs. Therefore, we opened a new factory in
San Diego towards the end of 2012. The factory is
designed to reach 280 MW at full production. 140 MW
are already operational. In South Africa, we are about
to launch the construction of the 44 MW project. We
have CPV installations worldwide in 14 countries at
the moment and we are expecting a significant growth
of the CPV market in several high DNI regions,” says
Hansjörg Lerchenmüller, Senior Vice President Product
Strategy of Soitec Solar Division.
Field Experience that will boost bankability
While expansion can be owing to several positive attributes,
the CPV sector should look at proving its promise on an
ongoing basis.
Field experience is one of the most important factors
to ensure high-levels of adoption and expansion of the
CPV market. Successful data showing consistent and
"We have CPV installations
worldwide in 14 countries at the
moment and we are expecting
a significant growth of the CPV
market in several high DNI regions,”

long-term performance track record from Amonix’s large
Cogentrix deployment and others including Suncore and
Soitec will demonstrate the ruggedness and reliability of
CPV while providing comfort and justification for larger
projects in the future.
One of the biggest challenges for the CPV sector is the
bankability of systems in new environments, especially
in the upcoming markets of the Middle East, which are
an attractive target market for CPV companies due to
potential for high DNI, says Dobrott.
“By having good field data, arranging the project financing
for the project will be much easier. This underlines how
crucial it is for CPV companies to get pilot systems on the
ground as quickly as possible,” he says.
US slowdown
Other than Spain, where current sentiments are expectedly
bearish, the US market is going slow due to the financial
markets’ conservatism due to lack of clarity on the
worldwide macroeconomic situation.
Other countries and regions, such as China and MENA
(Saudi Arabia) are leading adoption of the technology and
will be the short-term leaders.
At the same time, once the new technology risk is further
retired, then CPV has a chance to take its place as the
LCOE leader. There is a risk though that CPV remains a
nascent technology without people driving the technology
as much as possible domestically in the interim.
The major hurdle, no different than other new PV
technologies, is securing both funding and project finance
from lenders. Due to the current macroeconomic situation,
financiers have become exceeding conservative for project
financing limiting adoption. This adoption limit trickles
down to stunts future projects in CPV. Some companies
are self-funding – building the plant themselves and flipping
the project for sale to a solar plant owner / operator - and
others are securing creative financing.
Combatting Risk
Dobrott points out that the entire CPV value chain is
riddled with chicken-and-egg situations. The perceived
risk of a new technology gets increased by the financial
weakness of most system manufacturers, with operators
legitimately worrying about warranties and maintenance
contracts. Most of the component suppliers like cell
manufacturers do not have lot of visibility into the future
and hence cannot work on capacity expansions required
to reach economies of scale and push cost down, he
says. Also with many companies facing liquidity issues,
financing working capital is not easy for many CPV
manufacturers.
All of these factors lead to increased risk margins and
costs. For a plant operator, with an existing CPV plant,
there is quite little that can be done if a crucial supplier
or warrantor goes down except for hoping the system
survives throughout its designated lifetime.
Dobrott says warranty risks can be reduced by requiring
CPV companies to take direct stakes in the projects. Also
ramping up the project in phases with more relevant field
data from initial systems can help operator to reduce its
risk. Supply chain risks can be tackled if CPV companies
work closely with suppliers to reduce the capital
expenditure and working capital requirements, which will
help to manage the liquidity in this environment.
For future projects, plant developers need to look at the
supplier risk and might need to make some prepayments
to ensure that suppliers get the required commitment
to expand the supply to meet the demand from future
projects, recommends Dobrott.
I hope you have found this guide useful. With so many questions facing the concentrated
photovoltaic industry, PV Insider will be producing articles and
information in the coming months to address the big issues.
In addition, at CPV USA 2013 (23-24 September, San Jose, CA) the
industry will gather to discuss strategies to drive down costs and prove
the technology’s viability.
For more information, including speaker line-up,
agenda, and details of our conference exclusive
Solaria tour, visit www.pv-insider.com/cpv2013

The Current Status of CPV 2013

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The Current Status of CPV 2013