
Chapter 41
Factory for Sale, or the Long and Stony
Way to Cheap Solar Energy: The Story of
the Thin-Film CdTe Solar Cells; First Solar
and Others—A Semi-Autobiography
Dieter Bonnet
PV Specialist, Frankfurt, Germany
After four decades of more or less intense development, the CdTe
thin film solar cell is now becoming a benchmark in photovoltaics.
Modules based on cadmium telluride are manufactured on an
industrial scale and new ventures are popping up. The father of this
technology is Dieter Bonnet. Already in the 1970s, he made the first
cell of the configuration still used today. He contributed to the fully
automated module factory built in Arnstadt in 2000. ...