Solar Sunshot Sparking More Australian Manufacturing

Australia’s only solar panel manufacturer and several local polysilicon hopefuls have received a significant boost through the Albanese government’s Solar Sunshot initiative.

The $1 billion Solar Sunshot program, being delivered by the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA), seeks to grow Australia’s solar PV manufacturing industry by supporting local manufacturing innovation, scale and diversity.

ARENA announced yesterday it has awarded $34.5 million in new Solar Sunshot funding to support local panel manufacturer Tindo Solar scale up its Adelaide-based production from 20 MW to 180 MW of solar panels annually and expand its product range through renovating its still reasonably new Mawson Lakes factory. While the renovations will include introducing advanced automation, more than 50 direct jobs will also be created.

Additionally, Tindo will conduct a feasibility study on establishing an Australian solar panel ‘gigafactory’ capable of producing 1 GW of  panels annually, and develop a recruitment and training program to upskill PV manufacturing industry workers.

“This funding is a major step forward in establishing a robust Australian solar PV supply chain and will allow us to lower the cost of our high-quality solar panels, making them more accessible to homes and businesses nationwide,” stated the firm. “We’re proud to be at the forefront of Australia’s energy transition, playing our part in a cleaner, more sustainable future.”

Tindo has been a hive of activity in recent months; teaming up with the University of New South Wales to explore TOPCon solar cell technology, being chosen to supply more than 52,000 panels to Queensland’s Bowen Water Pipeline project, and securing a five-year $8.4 million deal to export 15MW of its modules to Vietnam.

Tindo started manufacturing panels using imported cells in 2011 and opened its new factory in Adelaide in 2021.

Local Polysilicon Feasibility Backing

Speaking of imported materials, polysilicon is a crucial material  for the manufacture of solar cells. China accounts for the vast majority of the world’s solar polysilicon (and cell and panel) production.

While polysilicon has been as cheap as chips for quite some time due to cut-throat competition between Chinese producers — putting somewhat of a dampener on a local polysilicon industry firing up — a major risk to Australia’s solar manufacturing future is our continued reliance on overseas supply chains.

Back in 2022, CSIRO published the Australian Silicon Action Plan indicating how Australia could develop a fully integrated silicon and solar cell supply chain; from mining the quartz to producing polysilicon ingots and wafers, to manufacturing cells and beyond.

Yesterday, ARENA also announced it had awarded three companies Solar Sunshot funding to support investigations into building a local supply chain. The recipients:

• $5 million to Solquartz to explore establishing a 100,000 tonne-per-annum low-emissions solar polysilicon plant near Townsville in Queensland.
• $1.3 million to Energus to investigate low-emissions polysilicon production (50,000 tonnes per annum) at AGL’s Hunter Energy Hub in New South Wales.
• $4.7 million to Stellar PV for a study into a 2 GW ingot pulling and wafering facility, also near Townsville.

As for local manufacturing of solar cells, there’s Sydney’s Sundrive; which is replacing silver in PV cells with copper — a material that’s more abundant, efficient and cost-effective. The firm already has a pilot panel production line and in October last year announced it was leading an application for Solar Sunshot funding in a joint venture with China’s Trina Solar, but there doesn’t appear to be any further news on that since. Then in January this year, SunDrive inked an agreement with AGL to explore the development of a manufacturing facility at Hunter Energy Hub.

Commenting on the ARENA funding announcements, Federal Minister for Climate Change and Energy Chris Bowen said:

“When it comes to powering Australia’s future, nothing will beat our sun and our solar knowhow. That’s why bringing more solar manufacturing to our shores is so critical for unlocking our future as a renewable energy superpower and securing the job of the future.”