In fact, in its latest report, Thin-Film Photovoltaics Materials Markets, 2001 and Beyond, Nanomarkets predict the PV materials market will generate $5.9 billion in 2016 compared to $2.1 billion in 2011.
The report includes its latest projections on material sales for thin-film silicon (TF Si), cadmium telluride (CdTe) and copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS) PV.
It also provides detailed profiles of the major firms in the sector including 5N Plus, Air Liquide, American Elements, Apollo Solar Energy, Applied Materials, Dow Corning, DuPont, Evonik, Indium Corporation, Linde, Oerlikon, Praxair, Redlen, Sputtering Materials, Ulvac, Umicore and Voltaix.
NanoMarkets believes that, despite its maturity, TF Si PV will retain its competitiveness as this technology shifts toward using tandem cells using microcrystalline silicon. Key beneficiaries of this shift will be silane suppliers. Revenues from TF Si PV absorber materials will reach approximately $975 million by 2016.
But by then, the research firm says, the largest segment of the TFPV material sector will be CdTe absorber materials, which, by then, will reach $1.6 billion.
This represents an important opportunity for suppliers of CdTe materials to qualify as a supplier to the dominant CdTe panel maker, First Solar, which is increasingly in need of more materials sources, the report says.
The growing use of tellurium also presents an opportunity for companies in the copper- and lead-refining industries, because tellurium is primarily a byproduct of refining these ores, NanoMarkets continues.
On another note, NanoMarkets holds that manufacturing and new product announcements over the past year represent a vindication of sorts for CIGS. The firm points to Dow's CIGS based BIPV product and TSMC's entry into the CIGS area as auspicious developments in the sector and goes on to predict that materials sold into this space will reach $610 million by 2016.
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