General Electric expects to exceed the 12.8 percent solar-efficiency record for thin-film modules when its first commercial-scale panel factory opens in 2013, possibly in Colorado.
Improving solar-panel efficiency, or the amount of sunlight converted to electricity, would help reduce costs to about 10 cents to 15 cents a kilowatt-hour without subsidies, making it more competitive with fossil fuels, according to Victor Abate, who oversees solar, wind and renewable energy at Fairfield, Conn.-based GE.
“Speed is the key here,” Abate said Wednesday at a conference in New York.
The 12.8 percent efficiency that GE reached for its cadmium telluride panels last year is an industry record for thin-film technology, and “we’ll be higher than that” when the factory opens. “Fourteen percent to 15 percent is in the cards.”
GE plans to select a site for the factory in the second quarter and to announce the location in the third quarter, Abate said. The company is considering Colorado and New York, where the company already employs hundreds of engineers.
