Hanwha Q CELLS turns to outsourcing
A 5 megawatt solar energy power plant built by Hanwha Q CELLS at Kalaeloa Renewable Energy Park, Hawaii. / Courtesy of Hanwha Group
By Lee Suh-yoon
Hit by low productivity and to save costs, Hanwha Q CELLS closed its key solar cell wafer fabrication facility in China, local media reports said, Sunday.
With the continued rise in need for renewable energy projects across the world, the demand for solar panels has seen a steep rise over the past several years. This market trend prompted budget Chinese manufacturers to increase their combined share in the photovoltaic modules, a critical component used in solar panels.
The closure came a few months after the industry started seeing an increase in the production volumes with the entry of new players with the Hanwha affiliate failing to secure its bottom line.
Reports said Hanwha Q CELLS has recently shut down the factory in Jiangsu province, China. The factory was Hanwha Q CELLS's only facility for producing solar wafers and photovoltaic modules.
Hanwha Q CELLS said the closure was mostly due to high maintenance costs. “It could have been better to buy solar wafers than manufacture them in terms of costs,” Hanwha officials were quoted as saying in the reports.
Hanwha Q CELLS's recent shift towards producing more monocrystalline solar panels also influenced the decision. The Jiangsu factory mainly produced wafers for polycrystalline solar panels. Due to higher silicon purity, monocrystalline solar panels have a higher energy output efficiency than polycrystalline ones.
However, Hanwha Q CELLS is not completely pulling out of the solar wafer industry. It is currently building a 500 megawatt solar wafer factory along with a solar power plant in Ankara, Turkey as part of a construction contract with the Turkish government.