Can the World's Worst CD and DVD Manufacturer Do Better with Solar Energy?

February 20th, 2009 by Matthew Phelan

Sun Well Solar—a subsidiary of the notoriously poor CD and DVD manufacturer, CMC Magnetics—has announced today that it is one month ahead of schedule in the ramp-up of its new photovoltaic production line.

Every 50 seconds, their Taipei Taiwan plant is currently producing one brand new, amorphous thin-film silicon solar cell—thanks to micromorph tandem-cell production equipment purchased from Oerlikon Solar.

As we’ve previously noted, Oerlikon has a long track record with thin-film solar innovations, but its production equipment is only as good as the, erghm … “electronics manufacturing services (EMS)” who buy them.

Last July, Oerlikon sold 60-MW and 120-MW solar production lines to Sun Well and made a similar deal with Singapore-based Flextronics. (Some of you may recall Flextronics as the company that introduced double the World Health Organization’s maximum for acceptable Nickel content into Guadalajara’s well water. At the time, they were making Xboxes for Microsoft there.)

Sun Well’s facility promises “more than 1,250 panels or 110 kW produced per day,” which according to their press release, “is equivalent to about 10% of the world’s module production, making Sun Well one of the largest in Asia.”

All well and good, provided that these solar cells don’t totally blow chunks.

Image credit: Orin Optiglot at Flickr under a Creative Commons license









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