General Electric Co., which this week said it would postpone construction of a $300 million solar-panel factory in Aurora, said Thursday it remains committed to the project — and intends to go ahead when the timing is right.
The facility would be the largest solar-panel manufacturing plant in the country and was to employ 355 people.
Last October, GE said it would retrofit and expand a 200,000-square-foot warehouse in the Majestic Commercenter near Interstate 70 and Tower Road, and the facility was to open in 2013.
But with the current oversupply of solar panels on the global market, prices have plummeted, putting GE’s Aurora plans on hold for about 18 months while it works on coming up with both a more-efficient and less-costly product.
“Absolutely, we remain committed to this project,” said Danielle Merfeld, GE’s general manager of solar technology. “We are not only committed to the project but committed to building out the factory in Aurora. It’s just a matter of the timing.”
Merfeld also said GE is “committed to thin-film technology and specifically to cadmium- telluride technology.”
But GE says that technology must be more efficient. Thin-film panels, the most affordable solar technology in the industry, convert 12.8 percent of sunlight into electricity. Conventional solar panels, made of silicon, convert 16 percent to 20 percent.
GE’s thin-film technology comes from PrimeStar Solar, an Arvada company that GE acquired this year. PrimeStar was capable of making 30 megawatts worth of solar panels a year. GE’s new plant aimed at producing 400 megawatts per year — enough to power 80,000 homes a year.
Merfeld said it was important for GE to “have the right technology at a competitive cost. The reality is the industry has shifted over the past six months. We’ve seen a 50 percent drop in the module price over that time period. With those market conditions, we can’t go forward at this time.
“There are more than two times the amount of modules being manufactured than are demanded. So we’re doubling-down, shifting back from manufacturing to technology development.”
China’s emergence in solar production has upended the industry. Chinese companies, which have focused on the lower-tech silicon technology, grabbed nearly half of the U.S. market for solar panels last year through aggressive price cuts and falling silicon costs, creating a squeeze on other solar manufacturers such as Loveland-based Abound Solar, a thin-film maker that announced last week it was filing for bankruptcy.
Solyndra, another thin-film company, filed for bankruptcy last year after defaulting on its loans from the federal government.
In May, the Obama administration slapped hefty antidumping tariffs on Chinese-made solar panels and cells.
John Mossman: 303-954-1479, jmossman@denverpost.com
