Uni-Solar

As the solar industry grows larger and the limits of technical design and research are pushed ever-outward, many solar engineers watch closely the developments at Uni-Solar, a firm that manufactures the kind of thin film electric modules and laminates that will push solar technology even further forward. Concentrating on innovative methods to wed cost-effectiveness with product reliability, the engineering stag of Unisolar Inc. are determined to provide consumers with value and convenience.

As a subsidiary of ECD Ovonics, Uni Solar has become one of the solar industry's true success stories. Making use of the technology that was pioneered and invented by their parent company ECD, Uni Solar has become recognized as a world leader in thin-film amorphous PV (photovoltaic) applications.

If we consider how far and how fast Uni Solar's journey to industry prominence has been, we can appreciate the excitement that was conjured by one of their first industry successes. When ECD's production technology and machine building division unveiled their first football-field long proprietary continuous web triple-junction solar cell manufacturing machine, the solar industry immediately took notice. This project showed that Uni Solar panels weren't going to be just like everybody else's. Indeed, as engineers studied this amazing device, they realized that this was the world's largest and most advanced machine for the manufacture of thin-film amorphous silicon alloy solar cells.

Uni Solar continued to astonish the scientific community by translating solar theory into solar practice, taking the promising technology they had pioneered another step forward by unveiling Auburn Hills 1 (AH1) and Auburn Hills 2 (AH2), state of the art facilities that operated at 28MW and 30MW respectively. AH2 came fully online with commercial production towards the end of 2006.

Capacity expansion continues for the inventors and makers of Unisolar panels. Expected to be fully-operational before the end of 2008, their third manufacturing facility is located in Greenville, Michigan. Greenville 1 (GV1) is being designed to have an annual production capacity of 60MW, twice the production capacity of either of the Auburn Hills facilities.

In 2008 Greenville 2 (GV2) is scheduled to become operational. It will be yet another 60MW facility. These plans are part and parcel with Uni Solar's stated goal of increasing its manufacturing capacity to 118MW, 178MW, and over 300MW per annum by the end of calendar years 2007, 2008, and 2010, respectively.

ECD Ovonics and United Solar Ovonic hold the basic patents covering the continuous roll-to-roll manufacturing of thin-film amorphous silicon alloy multi-junction solar cells. They currently employ over 700 people who design and manufacture their cutting-edge products.