On September 10, according to Xinhua News Agency, during his investigation and research in Heilongjiang, General Secretary Xi Jinping mentioned a refreshing word-"new quality productivity". The general secretary pointed out that it is necessary to integrate scientific and technological innovation resources, lead the development of strategic emerging industries and future industries, and accelerate the formation of new quality productivity.

The Xinhua News Agency report also pointed out that "emerging industries", "future industries" and "new quality productivity" are interrelated, with clear signals and rich meanings-actively develop and cultivate emerging industries and future industries, and use technological innovation to lead the industry in an all-round way Revitalize and drive the continuous emergence of new economic growth points. New quality productivity is different from traditional productivity. It involves new fields and high technology content. Relying on innovation drive is the key.

On September 28, Cai Xiaolong, a researcher at Zhongding Research Institute, told the reporter of "Daily Economic News" that the new quality productivity of the photovoltaic industry mainly refers to the productivity in which technological innovation plays a leading role. "We often say that the photovoltaic industry is very volumous, talking about the technological innovation of the photovoltaic industry, and the speed of technological iteration is extremely fast-because cost reduction and efficiency increase are the eternal pursuit of the photovoltaic industry."

Image source: Visual China (picture and text irrelevant)

"New quality productivity" is an extension of high-quality development

"The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China focuses on high-quality development, and the new and quality proposed this time is an extension of high-quality development. The interpretation from the new level is innovation at the technical level and innovation at the business model level. Especially at the cross-industry level of integration, the use of modern information technology and professional field knowledge to further improve production efficiency and quality." On September 28, Yang Bo, head of the macro strategy section of Zhongding Research Institute and deputy general manager and investment director of Shenzhen Zhuode, told the reporter of "Daily Economic News.

according to the economic daily, Zhong Baoshen, chairman of Longji green energy (SH601012, stock price 27.28 yuan, market value 206.8 billion yuan), said that taking the road of high-quality development is the inevitable choice of Longji green energy and the development trend of the industry. Adhering to scientific and technological innovation is an important engine to promote the high-quality development of the photovoltaic industry and enterprises.

"Today, China is shifting from manufacturing to intelligent manufacturing. In addition to technological innovation, digital transformation can improve production efficiency and help enterprises make efficient decisions. Longi Green Energy is striving to realize all-round digital transformation from decision-making to production and operation, so as to realize the high-quality development of the enterprise itself." Zhong Baoshen said.

As a branch of semiconductors, the photovoltaic industry is essentially a member of the high-end manufacturing industry. Many people disagree that photovoltaic is the business card of China's manufacturing industry. Everyone knows that chip manufacturing is high-end manufacturing, and there are many new players in the photovoltaic industry. The threshold seems to be not high, and it seems to have become an ordinary manufacturing industry.

"as far as polysilicon material is concerned, the purity of polysilicon material used in photovoltaic industry is required to be 6-9N, I .e. the purity of 6-9 9 after decimal point (there are several 9 after 99% decimal point), while semiconductor chip generally requires 11N." Cai Xiaolong said.

from another point of view, compared with Moore's law, the photovoltaic industry has a proprietary Swanson'Law (Swanson's law), which is that for every doubling of the cumulative shipment of photovoltaic modules, the price of products will drop by 20%. In the photovoltaic industry, the time period for price decline is about 2-3 times that of Moore's Law. For example, every 46.8 months of photovoltaic cell products, the price drops by 50%, and every 75 months of photovoltaic module products, the price drops by 50%; the final power generation cost Every 75 months, the price drops by 50%. In the past 15 years, the cost of electricity has dropped by 90%.

Cai Xiaolong, for example, said that from 1976 to 2014, photovoltaic modules dropped from US $100/watt to about US $0.6/watt. From 2007 to 2008, four photovoltaic power generation projects were approved in China, and the approved electricity price was 4 yuan/kWh. Now, most of the on-grid electricity prices are within 0.4 yuan/kWh.

Reducing cost and increasing efficiency is the eternal pursuit of photovoltaic industry

in 2006, when Shi zhengrong, known as the "godfather of photovoltaic in China", became the richest man in China, the photovoltaic industry was heavily dependent on foreign countries for raw materials, technology and markets, I .e. 90% of raw materials were imported, 90% of core technologies were not in hand, and 90% of products were exported to Europe and the United States.

around 2008, the cost of domestic polysilicon raw materials was about US $70/kg, which was much higher than the cost of US $30/kg of foreign large factories. now, the cost of silicon leader Tongwei shares (600438.SH, stock price 32.26 yuan, market value 145.233 billion yuan) is within 40 yuan/kg, with the cost falling by more than 90%. to achieve such a large cost reduction, scientific and technological innovation in equipment and technology is indispensable.

Data show that photovoltaic cells were the first to use polysilicon routes, because polysilicon ingots are cheaper to manufacture. The single crystal silicon must be grown in a crystal pulling furnace, and the purity of the silicon material is also required to be higher and the cost is higher. However, in terms of battery efficiency, the efficiency of mainstream polycrystalline silicon cells in 2015 was 17.8, and monocrystalline silicon cells have higher efficiency.

under the condition that the domestic polysilicon track is crowded, Longji green energy has decided to set the development direction as the monocrystalline silicon route with higher conversion efficiency and more room for reduction of electricity cost. In 2014, Longji took the lead in overcoming the industrialization problem of RCZ single crystal growth technology, increasing the output of silicon rods from 60kg per crucible to over 1500kg per crucible. At the same time, diamond wire was used for cutting, greatly reducing the cost of single crystal silicon route.

in the early days, the wire diameter of diamond wire was 120 microns, but now, the wire diameter of diamond wire has dropped to about 30 microns. for every 10 microns drop in diamond wire diameter, the cost of monolithic silicon will drop by about 0.15 yuan, the production capacity will increase by about 4%, and the cutting speed of silicon wafers will increase by 300, saving more than 30 billion yuan per year for the industry.

from the perspective of battery technology, the earliest AL-BSF (aluminum back field battery) to PERC (emitter passivation and back contact battery), and then to the current n-type TOPCon (tunneling oxide passivation contact) and HJT (heterojunction battery) have also gone through three generations of technology iteration.

probably in 2015, before Aixu shares (SH600732, stock price 22.37 yuan, market value 40.891 billion yuan) invented tubular PERC, polysilicon was 1.2 yuan/watt and PERC was 2.4 yuan/watt, which was basically twice the price. However, after Aixu officially introduced tubular PERC, Aixu's PERC sold 1.6 yuan in the early days, after 3-4 months, it quickly dropped to 1.3-1.4 yuan, only 1-2 cents more than polycrystalline, while the conversion efficiency was much higher than polycrystalline. PERC's advantages became more and more obvious, and finally iterative removal of polycrystalline became the mainstream of the market.

when the time comes to 2022, when the conversion efficiency of PERC is close to the theoretical limit, jingke energy (SH688223, stock price 10.10 yuan, market value 101 billion yuan) takes the lead in mass production of TOPCon, and makes the cost of TOPCon only about 0.1 yuan/watt higher than PERC, while the battery conversion efficiency reaches more than 25%, which is about 2% higher than PERC, realizing the replacement of TOPCon to PERC.

At present, large photovoltaic plants have begun to compete for scientific and technological innovation on new technical routes such as TOPCon, HJT and ABC, continuously promoting efficiency improvement and realizing LCOE (cost of electricity) reduction.

Image source: Visual China (picture and text irrelevant)

Cai Xiaolong said that many people simply think that the role of Chinese people in the photovoltaic industry is to reduce costs through scale. In fact, scale itself is a technological innovation of technology and technology, and various technical problems need to be overcome., Such as expanding the production line, increasing the pace of mass production, etc.

"in the early years, our silicon wafer was only 125mm in size, but now we can achieve 218mm, not on a large scale. among them, we have to overcome many technical problems in order to be large, thin and not fragile." Cai Xiaolong said that every cost reduction in the photovoltaic industry is achieved through higher photoelectric conversion efficiency. It is a brand-new battery technology system. It is not a simple innovation, but the latest technical solutions developed in the laboratory. On the high-speed mass production line, it is highly engineered and produced at a very low cost, defeating the original technology and completing the new technological iteration of the photovoltaic industry.

"long-termism" in promoting research and development of new materials and technologies

At the photovoltaic (energy storage) industry supply and demand forum held on September 21, Wang Bohua, honorary chairman of the China Photovoltaic Industry Association, said that the total installed capacity of renewable energy in the country this year has historically exceeded that of coal power. Among renewable energy, photovoltaic accounts for the highest proportion, and the speed of photovoltaic development is evident.

He introduced that on the manufacturing side, from January to July, the output of the main four links in the photovoltaic industry has exceeded 80% of the 2022 output; on the application side, from January to August, the installed capacity of photovoltaic power generation reached 113GW, A year-on-year increase of more than 150 percent.

"the installed capacity in the first eight months of 2022 exceeded the data in the first 11 months of 2021, and the installed capacity in 2022 reached the highest level in history, while the installed capacity in the first eight months of this year has far exceeded the level of last year." Wang Bohua said.

In terms of import and export, from January to July, the export volume of photovoltaic reached 32.4 billion billion US dollars, an increase of 4.6 per cent over the same period last year. "Exports fell 7 per cent year-on-year in July, mainly due to a more than 30 per cent drop in component prices in July. However, customs data show that exports have recovered in August, up 6 per cent month-on-month." Wang Bohua said.

It can be seen that the growth of China's photovoltaic industry is not temporary, but predictable "long-termism".

according to an article in Longji green energy official website at the beginning of this year, Li Zhenguo, founder and president of the company, said that whether it is to introduce the most stringent full life cycle quality standard in the industry, to advocate the industry to guard against the blind expansion of photovoltaic modules, or to promote more reliable BIPV (integrated photovoltaic building) products, Longji will start from the value perspective of the customer's full life cycle, lead the improvement of solar energy conversion efficiency with continuous high R & D investment, and create long-term value for the industry and society. "All Longi wants is to be a long-term activist."

On September 26, Li Zhenguo said at the 8th World Photovoltaic Energy Conversion Conference that under the joint promotion of climate action and energy transformation,By 2030, the world's annual new PV installed capacity needs to reach 1500GW-2000GW, in order to form an effective support for the global energy transition. This cyclical product renewal will also bring about huge stock replacement and will form a "too watt" sustainable market.

In the face of the arrival of the "Taiwa era", Li Zhenguo said that the top priority for the development of the global photovoltaic industry at present and in the future is to focus on the main track of improving battery efficiency, strengthen investment in research and development of new battery materials and technologies, do a good job in scientific and technological innovation, strive to reduce costs and increase efficiency, enhance the competitiveness of the photovoltaic industry, and promote the large-scale application of clean energy. At the same time, with the application of advanced technologies and breakthroughs in new technologies, the efficiency of commercial crystalline silicon cells will continue to improve.