Scaling Photovoltaics Manufacturing to Drive Down Costs
MIT SEMINAR SERIES IN MANUFACTURING AND PRODUCTIVITY
Place: Room 37-212 Time: 1:00 P.M. Thursday, October 18th, 2007
Dr. Peter G. Borden
Distinguished Member Technical Staff
Applied Materials, Inc.
Solar Business Group
Santa Clara, CA
Photovoltaics (PV) is in a very high growth rate period with compound annual growth rates of 35% or more. This year's sales will exceed 3 gigawatts of modules. PV now uses more purified silicon feedstock than does microelectronics. This talk will examine the cost benefits that can be reaped through the massive scale up of PV manufacturing and will speak to Applied Material's motivation for entering the field.
Specific topics will include:
- Exploiting synergies with IC and flat panel manufacturing to drive down PV cost through scaling
- The wafer-based silicon solar cell value chain and impact of scaling in that market
- Thin film solar cell technologies and the impact of scaling
About the Speaker
Dr. Peter Borden is a Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff with the Solar Business Group of Applied Materials. He joined Applied Materials in 2003 with its acquisition of Boxer Cross, Inc., which he co-founded and led as CTO to develop, market and sell metrology systems for VLSI process control. Previously, he co-founded and was Vice President of Technology for High Yield Technology, where he pioneered the first commercially successful in situ particle monitoring systems for VLSI process equipment. Earlier, Dr. Borden worked for Varian Associates where, among other positions, he led the Photovoltaics Group, working on III-V and silicon concentrator cells and systems. In this role, he and his group set performance records for cells, modules and arrays.
