Peroxide Initiators Will Continue To Enhance Solar Panel Manufacturing
Growth in the solar panel manufacturing industry will continue to drive the need for new and improved encapsulate materials used in photovoltaic modules, building on recent gains made in the performance of the ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA) encapsulates through peroxide initiators.
As demand for more-affordable solar power grows, the pressure is on the solar panel manufacturing industry to deliver higher-performing systems while keeping costs in line.
"With the focus on green and renewable energy production, this market is hot and getting hotter," said Onofrio Palazzolo, United Initiators commercial manager. "PVM encapsulates have been around for many years, and the solar panel manufacturing industry is constantly on the lookout for innovations and improvements. New PVM manufacturers are ready to jump in and learn about this growing market and the advantages they can gain through the crosslinking properties of peroxide initiators that enable PVMs to perform better."
United Initiators, with facilities in Elyria, Ohio; Mobile, Alabama; Pullach, Germany; Syndey, Australia; and Shanghai, China, is the specialist in customized organic peroxides and inorganic persulfate initiators. Peroxide initiators and other cross-linking agents are the sole focus of United Initiators' business, which is set up to supply products to the solar panel manufacturing market around the world.
Solar panel manufacturing will realize improvements in the performance of PVMs, as the silicon wafer arrays within the solar panels make gains in the amount of useable sunlight energy that is converted. United Initiators, the leader in organic peroxides and inorganic persulfate initiators in specialized, custom batches, is developing materials that will extend the life of silicon wafer encapsulates.
Increasing the lifespan of the encapsulates, by maintaining their transparency past the minimum of 20 years currently expected, will be achieved by advancements in the cross-linking achieved by better peroxide initiators.
United Initiators' scientists and technicians are looking to the future. They forecast increasing expectations among those in the solar panel manufacturing market, and those who fabricate components and build photovoltaic modules. The expectations center around enhancing performance of the ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA) through peroxide initiators. The task goes beyond supporting traditional PVMs; it extends to partnering with new engineering toward the development of better solar power generation into construction components, and even portable units, while continuing to reduce the carbon footprint.
"As more and more people become involved in solar panel manufacturing, and more knowledge is shared, all segments of the industry will better understand the opportunities afforded by advancements in custom peroxide initiators such as those we are developing," Palazzolo said. "Through the ongoing development of custom peroxide initiators, we can identify trends in the industry's needs and even predict, and thus prepare for, the needs that will be evident in the future."
Custom initiators enable solar panel manufacturers to design proprietary PVM encapsulates. "Those who succeed will gain competitive advantages," Palazzolo said. "As the drive for solar energy production advances, we all want to create a better solar panel than the ones that are currently out there."
United Initiators is the engineering resource for future PVM encapsulate needs. "We are engineering partners with our customers," Palazzolo said. "We build on our past experiences, and we are working on the next generation of PVM encapsulates and the materials that will make them perform better longer."
Palazzolo said more solar panel manufacturing professionals are entering the business and seeking new materials. "As more people get in this business, we continue to develop peroxide initiators to do what they will need to have done," he said.
Looking into the future, United Initiators expects PVM encapsulates to become custom tailored and thus become increasingly varied and multifunctional.
"We continue to optimize our initiators toward the PVM industry's objectives in intersurface adhesion and structural performance, weather and impact resistance, sunlight wavelength penetration, and other roles where EVA materials can deliver beneficial advantages," Palazzolo said.
For more information, visit www.PVMEncapsulates.com.
SOURCE: United Initiators