Prometheus thin film report:Thin-Film Solar Set to Take Market Share From Crystalline Solar PV

Thin-film solar production is expected to double in each of the next three years to reach 4.18 gigawatts worth of equipment in 2010, according to a report to be released by Greentech Media and the Prometheus Institute on Tuesday. (...) Most of the new companies are developing amorphous-silicon films on glass, which (...) has the lowest barriers to entry because companies can buy "turnkey" manufacturing equipment from suppliers such as Applied Materials and Oerlikon.

(...) They expect cadmium telluride, which had the highest production in 2007, to remain the most common thin film to be produced this year before being overtaken by amorphous silicon. Cadmium-telluride films, which have been popularized by No. 1 thin-film manufacturer First Solar, will end up as a niche technology adopted by only a few companies, they wrote, although First Solar will remain a significant player in the industry.

Meanwhile, copper-indium-gallium-diselenide technologies – also known as CIGS–- "[remain] the most exciting, but also the most elusive," according to the report. Grama and Bradford predict that 2009 will be a breakout year for the technologies.