DuPont Basks With
Solar Product Growth
As the need for renewable energy increases,
DuPont’s photovoltaic products continue to gain share.
BY CHARLES THURSTON
CONTRIBUTING EDITOR
Dupont expects sales from its multi-product plat- form photovoltaic (PV) unit to double to $1 bil- lion by next year, and a corporate goal for $2 billion in sales for such energy efficient products by 2014
seems attainable.
The company estimates that the overall PV market is
growing more slowly, at 30 percent per year. While the entire
industry still awaits commercial release of a paintable solar
film, the company has at least now secured a solid role in
solar panel and film manufacturing materials.
“The generation of renewable energy will be the fastest
growing sector in the energy market for the next 20 years,
and materials for photovoltaic applications are a critical
success factor for sustainable growth,” said Ian Hudson,
president of DuPont Europe, Middle East and Africa.
DuPont recently received the Queen of England’s Award
for Enterprise in Innovation for its Solamet photovoltaic
metallization paste, as a key component in increasing the
energy efficiency of solar cells.
While most of Dupont’s solar products are sold as films or
sheets, some are more liquid in form, with tight flow-rate
parameters. Among the products Dupont Microcircuit
Materials offers the PV market are its Solamet brand metallization pastes containing aluminum or silver which can
be soldered, printed or adhered through other processes on
either rigid or flexible substrates.
The company also offers polymer-based silver conduc-
tors for use on indium tin oxide (ITO) transparent con-
ductor oxide layers for front side grid applications in thin
film copper indium selenide (CIS), copper indium gallium
selenide (CIGS) and amorphous silicon cell structures.”
Other product lines include: Teflon and polyester film
module front sheet films; encapsulants including Elvax
polyvinyl resins, Butacite polyvinyl butyral, and PV5300
coatings for building-integrated solar roof tiles; back sheet
materials including Tedlar polyvinyl fluoride films; junction
box production resins, including Rynite thermoplastic resins;
film substrates including Kapton polyimide film including
ceramic-filled versions; seal manufacturing products includ-
ing Kalrez perfluoroelastomer; and Zonyl and Capstone
fluro-surfactants for semiconductor wetting aids.
Dupont PV 5300 encapsulants were key to the development
of frameless ceramic-tile based solar tiles produced by Italy’s
Photonics S.p.A., based in Modena, which will withstand foot
traffic from installation and maintenance workers. Such
building-integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) systems are expected
to become more popular in the U.S. as cost comes down.
Dupont also is installing solar arrays at various facilities to
reduce its carbon footprint. It operates the 1,500-solar-panel
Waimea Research Center PV array in Kauai, Hawaii, and has
other arrays installed in Wilmington, and at Taoyuan, Taiwan.
Since 2007, Dupont has managed the University of
Delaware’s Very High Efficiency Solar Cell (VHESC)
Consortium, which began with a $12.2 million grant that could
expand into a $100 million program, funded by the Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). CW
