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Sharp officially announces module production in Wales
Sharp Corp. officially has announced plans to start UK module production, not in Manchester as earlier rumored (see PI 10/2003, p. 8), but at its Welsh manufacturing division in Wrexham. This is the second time the Japanese world PV leader has gone for solar production outside its home country; Sharp started US module production in Tennessee in October.
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Sharp Corporation |
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Taking on Europe: Hiroshi Sasaoka, chairman of Sharp Electronics UK, holds the product soon to be manufactured at the company's facilities in Wales, Sharp's first PV production in Europe.
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The 20 MW capacity PV production facility in Wales announced on Oct. 30 will be set up in a building at Sharp Manufacturing Company of UK (SUKM) which until August had been used to manufacture video recorders. Michael Williams, executive director of Sharp's UK sales and marketing subsidiary in Manchester, who will oversee the SUKM production, says manufacturing is slated to start in April on one shift with 40 employees. Sharp hopes to reach full production of 175 and 160 W modules with three shifts by the end of 2004, doubling the number of workers, he says, and has plans to ramp up to 35 MW of capacity in 2005 with a second line. Sharp will also set up a unit for recycling modules at the site.
Although most of the modules will be exported to continental Europe, mainly Germany, the UK division was still able to beat out other Sharp European manufacturing operations in Spain and France for the solar production line. According to a company press release, the decision was partly based on UK government funding commitments to PV that would increase a 2003 demand of 6 MW (actually closer to 3.5 MW) to 20 MW annually by 2006. Williams confirms that he and Sharp representatives from Japan met with high-level UK members in Prime Minister Tony Blair's Labour government, pushing them
»to get their act together« for supporting PV programs. But a spokesman at the UK's Department of Trade and Industry says no promise was made to Sharp that the agency's main PV scheme, the Major Demonstration Programme, would receive funding for a second three-year phase when it comes up for review by the Treasury Department early next year.
London-based PV integrator Solar Century says it will begin joint product development with Sharp for the construction industry. While Williams says Solar Century will remain Sharp's
»preferred installer« in the UK, he adds that his staff will be looking at starting in-house distribution directly to
end-users.
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