Photovoltaic solar inverters are one of the “points of light” in an otherwise dreary economy —a fact that has not escaped the eggheads at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E).
To stimulate growth and adoption in the sector, this week, ARPA-E awarded $2.5 million to Spicewood, Texas-based Ideal Power Converters (IPC) to lead a team that will develop more lightweight and, consequently, less expensive, inverters.
What exactly are inverters? A typical solar power system consists of photovoltaic (PV) cells wired together to make panels. The panels are connected to inverters that convert the direct-current (DC) power they generate into the alternating current (AC) needed for residential power systems and grid-tie solar applications.
IMS Research, based in Wellingborough, England, recently reported that inverter suppliers now enjoy the highest gross margins of all solar module components, despite the recent oversupply and price reductions that the industry has suffered. They predict that inverter suppliers will generate 17 percent of total industry profits in 2011.
“While we are generally negative on solar panel companies, we continue to be favorably disposed to inverter companies, and we believe they have better supply/demand characteristics,” Dale Pfau, Cantor Fitzgerald analyst, Alternative Energy and Cleantech, based in San Francisco, wrote in a research note on October 12.
IPC (News - Alert) currently is developing light-weight, low cost inverters for the U.S. commercial PV market. The project goal of the ARPA-E grant is to reduce the weight of these systems by 98 percent—cutting the cost of materials, manufacturing, shipping, and installation. This project will accelerate these reductions by:
--Supporting the Department of Energy SunShot Initiative—a collaborative national program to make solar energy cost- competitive with other forms of energy by the end of the decade; and
--Driving down the cost of solar energy systems by 75 percent— enabling widespread, large-scale adoption that could, ultimately restore U.S. leadership in the global clean energy race.
Together with partners from Troy, New York-based Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Blacksburg, Virginia-based Virginia Tech, IPC will create a bidirectional silicon IGBT (insulated gate bipolar transistors). This entirely new type of power semiconductor device will be manufactured using standard processing equipment and materials, but optimized for IPC's breakthrough current-modulation power converter topology.
"Support from ARPA-E will enable Ideal Power Converters and our university partners to develop and commercialize an innovative silicon bi-directional IGBT switch that will dramatically improve performance and reduce costs of commercial rooftop photovoltaic systems," commented IPC Chief Executive Officer Bill Alexander, adding, "IPC will also apply this breakthrough technology to wind generation, battery inverters and high-power electric vehicle (EV) charging applications. Over the next several years, IPC and its US suppliers will create thousands of new jobs and enable the United States to regain technical and manufacturing leadership in this critical clean tech industry."
IPC’s initial product, a 30-kilowatt (kW) PV inverter, weighs only 94 pounds, considerably less than the 1,200-pound heft of conventional solutions, delivering over a 90 percent reduction in weight and size. This facilitates simple shipment and wall-mount installation savings of about 90 percent in inverter shipping and installation costs. The 30 kilowatt inverters are said to be near to commercial availability now. IPC won the "Top Utility Technology" Award at Clean Tech 2011 in June
Cheryl Kaften is an accomplished communicator who has written for consumer and corporate audiences. She has worked extensively for MasterCard (News - Alert) Worldwide, Philip Morris USA (Altria), and KPMG, and has consulted for Estee Lauder and the Philadelphia Inquirer Newspapers. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.Edited by
Juliana Kenny
