Pressure is on in race for new solar batteries

LG Electronics and LG Display, two affiliates of LG Group, are competing with each other to develop the next generation of thin-film solar batteries.

The battery’s greatest strength is its price competitiveness against the more widely used crystalline silicon solar cell. The manufacturing cost for thin-film solar cells is half that for crystalline silicon cells.
It is expected thin-film solar batteries, which took up 13 percent of the world’s solar battery market last year, will account for 30 percent of the global market in 2015.

But the largest hurdle the thin-film solar battery faces is its complicated manufacturing process. The conversion of solar energy into electricity has been difficult as a result.

The two Korean companies, neither of which have the basic technology to manufacture crystalline cells, are trying to raise their share of the global solar battery market with the development of thin-film solar cells.

And they may have something of an edge there, given that the technology is similar to that of liquid-crystal displays and light-emitting diodes, markets in which Korea has succeeded in recent years.

JoongAng Daily