Fraunhofer CSE Opens First PV Module Lab in U.S.
Fraunhofer USA Inc.'s Center for Sustainable Energy Systems (CSE) officially opened its first laboratory, a PV module innovation facility in Cambridge, Mass., which aims to increase energy yield, reduce costs and extend the durability of solar modules.
Aaron Hand, Executive Editor -- PV Society, 10/14/2009
Fraunhofer USA Inc.'s Center for Sustainable Energy Systems (CSE) officially opened its first laboratory, a PV module innovation facility in Cambridge, Mass., which aims to increase energy yield, reduce costs and extend the durability of solar modules. The new lab will include R&D, testing and evaluation of new materials and production processes.
Scientists will work with a broad set of state-of-the-art production equipment and characterization tools at the lab, which was celebrated Tuesday afternoon with a ribbon-cutting ceremony attended by German Ambassador Klaus Scharioth and Massachusetts Energy Secretary Ian Bowles, along with executives from Fraunhofer USA, MIT Energy Initiative and Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (ISE, Freiburg, Germany).
"We offer the capability of developing new module designs and optimizing manufacturing processes that incorporate new module materials in order to further lower the cost of PV electricity generation," said Roland Schindler, CSE's executive director, who joined the group last year from Fraunhofer ISE. "Some of our testing equipment is unique in its flexibility to enable measurement of energy yield under a wide variety of environmental conditions."
Nolan Browne, the center's managing director, also noted, "Fraunhofer CSE is fortunate to have very a talented team of scientists working in PV who bring a great depth of expertise in module materials, manufacturing and modeling."
CSE focuses on PV advances, while the CSE Building Energy Efficiency Group performs work related to energy-efficient buildings and components. An additional lab is being developed to conduct indoor and field tests, focused on studies on deep energy retrofits, residential energy management, and building-integrated PV (BIPV).
The Fraunhofer CSE facility is the latest link in the Transatlantic Climate Bridge, an initiative launched by the German government a year ago to promote joint U.S. and European work on the challenges of sustainable and renewable energy. CSE is financially supported through the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, National Grid and anonymous private donors in the United States; and by the German Federal Government's Ministry for Education and Research through the Fraunhofer Society in Germany as well as Fraunhofer ISE.
