After visiting the flagship Intersolar show in Munich in June the North American edition was not nearly as large, but the focus on North America offered various insights into developments in this very promising market. Production of PV cells, panels and related products and services is ramping up steadily and much of the show was devoted to improving production processes and reaching the sophistication of the semiconductor industry, which was on display around the corner in the other halls of the Moscone Center.

In fact, manufacturers of equipment, devices, materials and software supporting the cell and panel producers were more of a presence than North American thin film and crystalline silicon manufacturers. These are popping up around the United States and Canada, but their presence at the show was marginal, at least as exhibitors.

The upstream focus of Intersolar North America differs from the next big solar show in North America, Solar Power International in Los Angeles from October 12th to 14th, which concentrates more on the downstream installation side of the PV industry. Intersolar North America is 30% bigger than last year, but there is still the sense that the big upswing in North American solar is still ahead of us. Suppliers are jockeying for position in the race to be in a good position when the race really begins. One example is SPARQ Systems Inc. from Kingston, Ontario, a supplier of microinverters. Like other exhibitors at the show, SPARQ took advantage of the publicity provided by the show to launch their product or service offering. Sparq’s microinverters integrate directly with PV panels thereby eliminating the need for a separate DC power handling. They also provide a 25-year warranty for their inverters, which seems quite bold, given that they just launched their product and have limited exposure to real world conditions. On the other hand, as their Communications Manager, Mary Anne Beaudette, mentioned to me at the show, the internal components of the Sparq device are selected and designed in such a way that they are less susceptible to degrade over time compared to competitors like Enphase. The microinverter space will be an interesting one to follow, as is the debate between the microinverter league and the established camp of conventional (centralized) inverter manufacturers.

So there was plenty of innovation on display at the Moscone Center and this was not really a surprise given the show’s location in San Francisco right next to Silicon Valley.

After seeing a multitude of Chinese PV and solar thermal manufacturers at last week’s Intersolar, I journeyed to Shanghai a few days ago to visit this year’s Expo (among other things). True to China’s size and growing political and economic clout this Expo is vast with huge pavillons and public areas to fit the onslaught of mainland Chinese visitors. As one German guide to the Hamburg House told me, 99% of visitors are Chinese, leaving a relative trickle of foreign visitors.
Sustainable city development is a key theme of this Expo and there’s no better place to address this issue than in this teeming metropolis of high-rises, elevated highways, modern bridges and subway lines and beautiful new airports and railway stations.
Since I will be back in Shanghai in late August I spent most of today on the western side of the Huangpu river, which divides Shanghai and seperates the older Puxi region from the new Pudong development area. The Huangpu also divides the Expo into a smaller western half and a much bigger eastern half (in Pudong). But despite the smaller size, I had plenty to see and didn’t even cover all the pavillions, mainly bacause the lines at some of the more popular venues (like the GM-SAIC pavillion showcasing this automotive joint venture) were very long.
So the scale is unlike anything we see in Europe and I found the China Railway Pavillion quite amazing with its shiny models of the vast new railway terminals in Shanghai, Beijing, Changsha, Guangzhou and Lhasa in Tibet (the latter was shown in a video on the new Himalayan plateau link between Qinghai and Lhasa).
The energy needs of China are clearly immense, especially if this country keeps on growing at a clip of 8% per year (or more). Equally clear is the need to address environmental concerns and make such growth (with 1.3 billion people and a growing middle class) sustainable. This need was certainly highlighted at the Expo and I was impressed by the candor in one display in a Shanghai city pavillion, where it said that 70% of China’s rivers are polluted and cannot be used for drinking water. On the other hand, there was little mention of specific goals to improve the environmental situation or boost renewables (at least on this side of the Expo) and this contrasted with specific targets I saw in the very eco-friendly Hamburg House (the first certified “Passivhaus” in China!) and other presentations of foreign cities and regions. The Hamburg House uses PV panels on its roof to pump and heat water and supply electricity to the building. Its quite a construction and the restaurant provided a welcome place to regain energy after several kilometers of walking between and up and down pavillions.
On my way out of the western Expo site I stopped in the National Grid and National Railway pavillions where there was plenty of glitz (like the Magic Cube light show put on by the National Grid) but also an emphasis on renewables (especially wind and solar were highlighted in the Grid pavillion) and energy efficiency (for example, in displays showing the rail network and high-speed train development).
I look forward to part 2 of my Expo visit in August and I might have to allocate two full days the next time around. I heard today that lines to the German pavillion are 5 hours long, so I hope that changes for the better by the time I am back. Long lines are not really consistent with this Expo’s byline “better city, better life” but even with this mega space, lines are probably unavoidable with these masses of people eager to glimpse where China (and the rest of this planet) are going.