Evergreen looking at production of thinner wafers by end of year

Evergreen Solar Inc. says it has the potential to produce silicon wafers thinner than 150 µm and is scaling up pilot operations to start commercial production possibly by the end of 2005.         

In a Dec. 7 Evergreen press release, Brown F. Williams, vice president of R&D at the Massachusetts-based string ribbon manufacturer, claimed the process will cut »the use of silicon in half for us and by a factor of three when compared to conventional methods.« The Evergreen string-ribbon process does not require wire-sawing of ingots.

According Richard M. Feldt, Evergreen's president and CEO, the thinner wafers have been made possible by an enhancement of its Gemini II double-ribbon growth process. Feldt said nothing about how Evergreen was dealing with problems of breakage for the thinner wafers, saying only that the yield from pilot quantities »has been encouraging."« During the scale-up period, Evergreen plans to debug its wafer, cell, and module manufacturing processes for the thin ribbons. The company has filed a patent application. 

William P. Hirshman
© PHOTON International, January  2005