Steel Roofing BIPV Manufacturing Project Moves Further Ahead

The joint project between Dyesol UK Limited and Corus to commercially manufacture dye solar cells (DSC) on steel has moved to the next stage with the achievement of the fifth milestone.

The project is supported by the Welsh Assembly Government (WAG) to a total of £5 Million and on Aug. 5, the milestone review meeting was held at the joint PV Accelerator facility, on the Shotton site of Corus, which houses the 30-person technology team bringing this unique building integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) product to market. Once again the milestones were achieved ahead of schedule, on budget and the Welsh government commended the teams progress as exemplary.

During the joint planning meetings held following the milestone review, Kevin Bygate, development director of Corus Colors, informed the project team that senior management of both companies have “committed to continue to accelerate the project.” Corus and Dyesol have now progressed to the next phase of production development to be completed in May 2010, coinciding with the start of the industrialization phase of the WAG project.

During this period, extensive production trials will be undertaken on the pilot production line at Shotton and the product manufactured will be subjected to rigorous acceptance testing and placement on demonstration sites.

As well as having provided the DSC technology design for the project, Dyesol is the exclusive supplier of DSC materials to Corus and the companies will together commercialize the products worldwide. Based on the existing coated steel market of mor than one billion square meters per annum, the annual addressable market is forecast to be over 200 million square meters of photovoltaic product. The advantages of DSC in this market are lower cost of manufacturing plant, lower production cost, better performance in normal solar conditions and a range of natural colors.