By Johanna Schmidtke, Analyst, Lux Research

During the rapid growth in the solar industry in the past several years, the spotlight has focused intently on the active semiconductor materials and processes critical to solar electricity generation, particularly crystalline silicon (x-Si) wafers, and amorphous silicon (a-Si), cadmium telluride (CdTe), and copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS) thin films. “Non-active” materials – all those materials used in cells and modules other than the active layers – garner far less attention, but significantly impact both the cost and efficiency of today’s modules, accounting for 14% to 49% of module costs, depending on the technology. Non-active materials supply is dominated by specialized players, but challenged by new entrants. However, current non-active materials limit device efficiency and require high-cost components, so we set out to review coming developments in non-active materials—including metallization, transparent conducting oxides (TCOs) and their replacements, antireflection (AR) coatings, and encapsulants —to identify specific market opportunities and technology frontrunners.

Specifically, we found that, while several non-active materials technologies will make their way to commercial scale in the next three years to five years, these new materials are largely improvements upon today’s technologies. The earliest adoptions will occur among non-active materials technologies that offer a “new take” on today’s incumbents, but still utilize similar materials/components, low-cost capex equipment, and large-volume materials suppliers. To succeed in the longer term, radically new materials need to show significant cost and efficiency improvements. Many of the non-active materials with the greatest potential impact on $/W module production costs utilize novel materials, implement new manufacturing processes, or require significant scale-up in materials production. These technologies each face their own challenges in reaching both a lower $/W manufacturing cost as well as scale-up to large areas.

As these “non-active” technologies develop, large entrants and x-Si incumbents will roll-up non-active material features to boost slim margins, while non-active materials providers for thin-film modules will see greater margin potential, albeit with longer development cycles.

September 23, 2009