Two companies that provide solar power systems have decided to expand the availability of solar leases with no down payments. The company Sungevity has just launched a new 10-year residential solar lease, which has no upfront costs.

(more…)

Japan says it is a leader in solar cell manufacturing. Taiwan and China want a piece of Japan’s solar panel market, especially considering the onslaught of business that is expected.

Meanwhile, a Taiwanese solar cell manufacturer Gintech Energy Corp. will supply Japanese companies this year on an OEM basis.

Low-cost production is why Gintech hopes to sell 50,000kw to 75,000 kW worth of solar cells each year to Japan. Gintech is already talking with Japanese clients – specifically, those companies that assemble and market solar power systems.

Gintech has a solar cell production capacity of 660,000 kW a year in Taiwan. Gintech’s major market is Europe and has sold just 5,000 kW of solar cells to a Japan.

Suntech Power Holdings Co. is the world’s third-largest solar cell manufacturer. The Chinese producer hopes to begin a major sales push in Japan also this year. “We are now able to supply sufficient volume of products to the Japanese market,” Chief Executive Officer Zhengrong Shi says.

And we’re on a good track, isn’t it?

Original image by Okinawa Soba

Toyota is coming out with a new Prius, a solar-powered Prius. The car will have solar panels in its roof that will be used to run the car’s air conditioning. And, when does a car need air conditioning? Right! When the sun is out.

The 2010 Prius is expected to get 55+mpg, be plug-in-able, smaller, a wagon, and even Li-ion battery carrying.

How cool is Toyota?

The solar panels will go on the high-end version of the Prius = be expensive.

The solar panels will be made by Kyocera.

Prius had its debut in Japan in 1997. So far it has sold more than 1 million vehicles worldwide. The 2G version came out in 2003. The 3G version is due out this year.

Osaka’s Sharp Corp has a new residential solar cell panel (polycrystaline) that Sharp says has the highest solar-to-electric conversion rate to date. The new environmentally friendly product is called SunVista and will be released on Jun 18th. The addition of a third main electrode instead of the conventional two is the difference.

Sharp’s conversion rate will be 14.4% compared to the until now best 13.7% of Kyocera.Panels will retail for about $460-990. And Sharp wants to sell 17,000 of them each month!

Let’s see, what’s 17,000 x $600-700?

source