Latest / Clean Power Hour / Swift Solar's Plan to Close the 10x U.S. Solar Cell Gap

Transcript

Swift Solar's Plan to Close the 10x U.S. Solar Cell Gap · Clean Power Hour

• 0:50
  Tim Montague: Wow! Welcome to the Clean Power Hour live. Today is july 10, 2026 Bringing you the latest and greatest wind, solar, and battery news. We have a special guest today, but first, of course, I'd like to welcome John Weaver, my co-host.
• 1:07
  Tim Montague: Welcome, John.
• 1:09
  John Weaver: Hey, Tim. I'm here again. We're here with somebody very cool. You should introduce him before you introduce me.
• 1:15
  John Weaver: Come on now,
• 1:17
  Tim Montague: Tim. It's true, John. I should. Well, our guest today is Dr. Gunter Er furt, former CEO of Meyer Berger, winner of the 2023 Beckerell Prize, and now the man leading heterojunction technology integration at Swift Solar, following the March acquisition of Meyer Berger's assets, IP and engineering bench, check out my recent interview with Joel Jean, the CEO of Swift Solar. That's episode 351 on the Clean Power Hour. Welcome to the show, or welcome back to the show, I should say, Gunter. Welcome.
• 1:48
  Gunter Erfurt: Thank you, Tim.
• 1:48
  Gunter Erfurt: Thank you, John. Great pleasure to be here again.
• 1:52
  Tim Montague: Great to see you,
• 1:54
  John Weaver: and I'm super excited that your solar cell line that you've been working so hard on in the U.S. to get going now is moving again. It's not running yet, but it's moving, and that makes me happy. So really great to see you and your gear being worked on. So thanks, thanks for sticking
• 2:12
  Tim Montague: to it. So. so you know
• 2:15
  Gunter Erfurt: I cannot do anything else. Apparently, I tried. I tried very often. I tried from solar, but no, no, you're ours now. We own you.
• 2:21
  Gunter Erfurt: You're ours. So welcome back.
• 2:26
  Tim Montague: So Gunter, why don't we start with how exactly did you and Swift Solar come to an agreement.
• 2:34
  Gunter Erfurt: Yeah, so I have I have left Meyerburger in September 2024 and took a little break after after this pretty challenging ride, and then I got approached by Swift Solar asking me if I would be willing to join their advisory board, and I did.
• 2:57
  Gunter Erfurt: And then you do what you do as an advisory board member. You have your one-on-ones with the CEO once in a while, and then you know later in 2025, Swift came forward with this concept of acquiring these assets, for in my view, very very smart and strategic reasons, because the story is simple: if you want to scale solar manufacturing in the U.S. and looking at what's happening geopolitically and with with all the restrictions of buying Chinese equipment, all the restrictions on the IP side, Topcon being currently so much fought over, it was a very smart move to acquire pretty much the strongest IP asset package in the Western world, plus equipment, most modern, most automated, and equipment that was already built to be brought to the U.S. for Meyerburgers lines, and of course there was an ask if I could consider to extend a bit my role in in Swift Solar and join also on the you know operations or executive side, and then it didn't take me that long to accept it, and so now I'm leading the efforts here in in Germany. We have established 100% wholly owned subsidiary of Swift Solar Inc.
• 4:26
  Gunter Erfurt: in Germany, and I'm managing director together with the former Meyerburger CTO Marcel Koenig. Very
• 4:35
  Tim Montague: cool. Very cool.
• 4:35
  Tim Montague: So, if I understand correctly, Joel Jean and Company have acquired your assets, which means they now own the the HGT production capabilities of Meyerberger, right?
• 4:55
  Gunter Erfurt: That's exactly correct, including some very important and critical IP, including Meyerberger's heterojunction back contact technology IP, which is also something super exciting, but I think most important is for Swift's plant scaling in the U.S. and the own factory we want to build that the equipment is already paid in a way, you know, acquired at a very interesting price, of course, from the insolvency proceedings, and it's ready to go. It's it was all made for use in the in the U.S.
• 5:37
  Gunter Erfurt: Also, in terms of you know what what is maybe a bit U.S.
• 5:44
  Gunter Erfurt: specific here and there. So it's it's it's a pretty well matched.
• 5:48
  Gunter Erfurt: And then what we also did is, you know, when you look at Swift being a perovskite technology startup, I told Joel after the acquisition we have to we have to depart from from you know thinking about us as a startup.
• 6:09
  Gunter Erfurt: It's now a scale up because we have also expanded our our capabilities in terms of which TRL technology readiness level phases we can internally tackle, and whereas Swift Solar before the acquisition did you know fabulous advanced research on on tandems, we have now kind of bolt on a team which is super familiar on industrialization, i.e. the later TRL levels, which are required to develop a bankable production technology, and that is a game change, if you will, for this company. And of course, it also comes with a lot of challenges because we have doubled the number of employees within you know two months by 100% So we are now a little bit above 100 people, pretty much 50-50 in U.S. and Germany, and of course also the plan that more is to come. But I'm also very pleased with the professionalism that this California. startup and the combination of you know the experience we bring in, so we we we are well established also already on the operational side communication and you know nine hours time shift between Central Europe and California can be a challenge because now is the time when when the team there is you know getting up to speed, and we are we are already waiting for the first beer in the evening, right?
• 7:39
  John Weaver: So I had a conversation with Joel the other day. It was cool to listen to where he's at progress wise with the perovskites, because that for me is always the whiz bang.
• 7:49
  John Weaver: This is the cool next best thing, but the reality is that the current best thing is Topcon HJT back contact. Those are the biggest things in the world right now in terms of solar cells. The top three by far, Topcon leading, and I'd never actually heard someone say heterojunction back contact before. So that was kind of cool for you to say that a moment ago, because you know I'm used to just back contact kind of being an extension of Sun Power's technology from way back when, and this is or at least similar to it. So, but when I was talking with Joel, the most interesting thing I heard, well, among many things, but regarding the new cells, is that the team actually plans to sell heterojunction cells first? Get the business going. You got the machines, as you said, they're probably packed perfectly in boxes, ready to go somewhere.
• 8:45
  John Weaver: And and and then before the show started, you mentioned you guys are working toward deploying and getting things set up. You don't have any dates when you're going to sell, but that I thought was cool. You know, it's hard to do R and D and fund a company and grow a company all on, and you know this well. You've worked so hard at raising money at different points. I've watched, but it's hard to run a startup on its own. But then you throw in some cash and you have some revenue, and you're selling solar cells in the United States, which is a high-priced solar cell market because of the incentives, and that kind of gives me a little more hope that you know this potential solution is gonna get get pushed on it.
• 9:25
  John Weaver: And so, so I'm I'm just excited to hear about it, and I'm wondering, do you see like clear, I mean, clear testing pathways for the for their perovskite tech and Meyerberger's HJT? I'm sure you wouldn't have gone with it if you thought they were just different direction technologies. But how does it make you feel seeing HJT and perovskite sit next to each other. I mean, I know you want to see the HJT chips go because that's just your love. But you know the Meyer Burger chips-they must-they must be built. But how's it feel with those two techs next to each other? I mean, is it still a 10-year tech or is it three years? Maybe I don't know.
• 10:11
  Gunter Erfurt: Yeah. So I I. I, I, you know, I could be perceived biased, of course, as a as an fatigue lover. But if we just look at the fundamental facts, then I strongly believe that heterojunction is the best bottom cell ever for a perovskite on silicon technology, and and why is that?
• 10:40
  Gunter Erfurt: Because
• 10:45
  John Weaver: the the don't worry, we don't hear it, Gunter.
• 10:48
  John Weaver: That's not a cell phone ringing.
• 10:48
  John Weaver: No worries.
• 10:51
  Gunter Erfurt: Some someone tries to call me, so let me switch this off here. So back to solar cells. The you need to have an interface between at least for two two terminal structure an interface between the top and the bottom cell. And you know Meyerberger has in the past already produced bottom cells for various in various projects and for various companies. So we have a lot of experience already in this one, and we know that you can pretty much plug and play a classic heterojunction solar cell into a perovskite line. Of course, there are some tricks to it to improve it. By the way, also something that is a huge asset now in this new setup because we can now out of our out of Germany supply also solar cells to Swift for development. That's also possible, and you know, make sure that any secret source that ties into interface design between top and bottom cell is kept within within our group, which is impossible when you when you source those from from third parties. You know, that's that's that's a that's a big advantage. And it is also true that. silicon technology per se has further evolved and developed and breathtaking. I mean, what we've recently been reading in terms of champion cells achievements of more than 28% Nobody would have believed this like five years back, and but we also know, because we cannot we cannot cheat physics, that this is you know the the last improvement we are going to see because we are reaching the ceiling of single junction silicon solar cells, and I also don't think that manufacturing will be able to to do like 28.2 or what these champion cell results were in mass manufacturing. That's I think when you look at these the structures and also how they are making the anti reflective coating, you know it's a it's a cell efficiency measurement. I guarantee you, if you take this champion cell into a module, it will not perform as good because you know usually for these champion cells there's a lot of you know stuff being done to the anti-reflective coatings to super improve them which would never work under glass. So there will be a lot of restrictions when trying to put it into mass manufacturing. So we have numbers physical limit ceiling, which is there, so we cannot go beyond with a single junction cell. And the second argument I would make, why it is also a good thing for perovskite development, is that any efficiency improvement on the bottom cell is going to, you know, help perovskite tandem structures, and those will benefit from because, as we know, bottom cell efficiency is going into by you know a factor of two, something like this, or 50% of it plus the top cell performance. So you know, any any increase in performance of the bottom cell will help also the tandem structure, so it's it's you know kind of a co-development that kind of a passive co-development perovskite researchers and developers will definitely benefit from, and I also am a strong believer being in that industry now since 2023 years.
• 14:30
  Gunter Erfurt: So I joined Solar World in July 2023 as a very young guy, and and we have seen this progress of you know 0.5 absolute efficiency percent every year, and so now we we can now a bit make up our calculation if we assume best, you know, back contact technology today. Where is it? Maybe 20-5% around this, until we have reached the ceiling in modules, maybe of, I don't know, 2020-7% or so.
• 15:04
  Gunter Erfurt: That's going to be that's going to be for a year, four years, right? So let's say four or five years, and that's that's what also drives perovskite research.
• 15:18
  Gunter Erfurt: And a challenge in perovskite research, in my view, is that we have no alternative. So there is no parallel path that people are pursuing to choose from if perovskites won't work.
• 15:29
  Gunter Erfurt: So that is it's kind of a must-win thing, and on the other hand, if you really concentrate and focus on one technology that's also releasing so much energy, funding whatsoever, I'm I'm super convinced it's going to be successful. But you know, one one comment, John, to your question: Yes, it makes a lot of sense to take a proven.
• 15:49
  Gunter Erfurt: Technology like Myerburger's heterojunction technology, which has already produced bankable product, in particular in the U.S. tested by Kiva and and others, and people have seen top performance and simply you know make a good business out of it.
• 16:10
  Tim Montague: Gunter, I think it would be useful if you would just give us a one-on-one on what exactly is Swift Solar developing and how is it fundamentally different than standard commercial solar panels today.
• 16:25
  Gunter Erfurt: Well, so the company was founded in 2017 and I think this Joel explained it in in in the other episode in in in length to develop perovskite on on silicon, and so that this has been the strong focus. The company has, in to my knowledge, and what I what I'm what I'm seeing always use heterojunction bottom cells, so this this is a strong fit, and of course with a strong focus on scaling it. So it doesn't really make sense to only produce cells in the laboratory of small size, but it's important to have the ability to go with the real commercial wafer sizes, and of course also trying to tackle the longevity reliability issues, which we all know are still there, and combine them with the heterojunction technology. And maybe another aspect I want to bring in is, you know, we are talking a lot about the cell part, but among the team in Germany that we have hired is a team of you know 567, I don't exactly. I don't know exactly of module specialists who know how to integrate things very reliably into a module, and this is also a huge asset in our new setup. So these people, they were trained at Meyerburger to you know produce or generate products with, you know, in the best the best case only 8% in power loss in 30 years. And so this knowledge, how you encapsulate, how you seal a module. Of course, this is also going to go into our now expanded development work for the new products, and that's you know what I would see as a difference. Sometimes people don't see that R and D doesn't end at you know producing a nice champion solar cell, but these these later TRL levels. That's kind of a rule of thumb that for every TRL level enrichment, once you have passed from six and you go to seven, you need you need to double the budget. So, what I'm saying is the the effort even increases when you when you when you want to industrialize a product, and I think that's in TV sometimes a bit underestimated. So we we we look at you know champion cell results and what institutes are doing, and you know don't get me wrong, they do a do a fantastic job, but it doesn't create a bankable product. And I strongly believe that in our setup now we have a certain strength in it, and that can also make a unique difference. The
• 19:17
  John Weaver: encapsulation that you mentioned earlier-you at some point, Meyerberger was considering a was making a strong push toward glass glass modules-and I actually wrote about it. I was super excited. I remember a prior conversation we had where you were doing degradation testing, and your lawyers made you do a .3 or a.25 drop because in the testing period you actually showed minimal degradation, and you had to put something. And I know I believe that comes heavily from the glass, the seal that occurs, the encapsulation seal of a glass glass module versus a plastic backed module, and so that encapsulation you mentioned it, and it like reinvigorated my thinking when you said a 8% loss over 30 years, but that encapsulation seems like it's turning out to be an important factor in perovskites. Like we have to be better at encapsulating than we were before, and we were already really good at encapsulating. So I know there's other layers and techniques. Like we're actually getting down into the molecules and looking at the edge of the solar cell and sealing them and and doing things. And so it's just just interesting to to see these things go over it. And your and the statement you just said of moving from say a solar cell to making a module and then making it bankable. The amount of money, like wow, that's just it already costs a lot of money to build a factory. Now you have to think about the humans. The testing and and then sending those modules off and breaking them and doing this to them and that to them and all the mean stuff you guys have to do the modules before you sell them. So I'm just that's interesting thought. Do you guys have any physical locations? I guess is the Colorado City facility still on the table or or is that facility gone now? Different deal, different company type of stuff.
• 21:14
  Gunter Erfurt: So the the Colorado Springs facility is is not in our site search list, but other other very very good locations. So I won't tell which is you know the top runner, but I've I've I've seen it and it's breathtaking. It's really, really cool. So working on it, and as soon as this is a firm deal, will very likely also communicate it. Of course, is it in
• 21:42
  John Weaver: Cambridge, Massachusetts, by any chance?
• 21:44
  Gunter Erfurt: I'm not.
• 21:46
  John Weaver: No, we know it's not. I know that, but
• 21:50
  Gunter Erfurt: yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 21:50
  Gunter Erfurt: So, so on on on on the glass glass, I think that's not only my belief. I think it has it has also now made it into some sort of PV mainstream that glass glass is the best you can do.
• 22:02
  Gunter Erfurt: And this is not only for the encapsulation and you know avoiding that you have moisture creeping in, but it's also for the mechanics, which is also easy to explain. And I was totally, you know, when I saw the first electroluminescence picture like 10 years ago or 15 years ago, it was still at Solar World, so it must be longer than 10 years. So we had we had a glass glass panel and a glass backsheet panel, and you may remember Frank Aspbeck. So he's a he's a he's a fairly fairly large person. So at the time, some you know at least 250 pounds or so, and so we would have we would have walked him over or on the glass glass and the glass backsheet, and did I walk on
• 22:54
  John Weaver: panels? We're not supposed to do that, Hunter. We
• 22:56
  Gunter Erfurt: did, but I'll tell you what we did. We did a live show. We did a live show of electroluminescence. So we took that thing in the mobile electroluminescence thing, put it down. He walked over. The same for the glass backsheet. So the glass glass was that was not a single micro crack in it, and the glass backsheet was, you know, was looking awful. And I mean, what's already also known is when you unpack a glass backsheet panel and you carry it to the site or to the roof or to the wreck, it has microcracks already from that little moving around and handling, as opposed to the class class, because you have you have you have the solar cell if you have a symmetric structure with front and back glass being of the same thickness, and that's what everybody does. You have the cell sitting in a kind of zero force lamella, so the resulting force from bending and bowing is exactly zero, and so that's why you have no cracks in the in the cell. So that's one thing, and of course glass is the perfect the perfect moisture barrier. So wherever you have glass covering your cell, you don't need to worry. So what you need to worry, and where the focus of the of the engineers is always going into are the holes for the junction box, and the edges. So the edge seal and the junction box seal, these are the critical areas of a solar panel. The glass is glass is you know water vapor safe. There's there's there's no transmission at all, but edges and the the the holes for the for the terminals to stick through that's the problem and that's what you need to focus and that's going to be even more challenging for perovskites versus heterojunction.
• 24:46
  John Weaver: So with just so I can maybe firm up what you said when you said the cell is floating in a glass plastic backsheet. The cell essentially attaches to the backsheet and they sits on top of it with a bunch of layers. Whereas in a glass glass, the cell and its layers float in between the glass. So when the glass moves, is it that the cells kind of are isolated?
• 25:12
  Gunter Erfurt: No, no, no. It's I think since we are using the same material, you know, you have you have a EVA or PUE on both sides, and then you laminate. I I think mechanically, in terms of you know the integrity and how stiff, if I may say so, things are. That's the same, but the force applied to the cell, the resulting force is, you know, you have something from from the front class, and you have a force coming from the back glass. If this entire thing is is you know, bowed or whatever, and the resulting force that's applied to the cell is zero.
• 25:43
  Gunter Erfurt: That's that's the trick of of a class class package. There is essentially no no. Mechanical force applied to the cell-it's totally protected, unless you you hit the panel with a hammer or you know hail balls or something like this. But the typical classic you know pressure or you know mechanical stress that the panel sees, wind for instance, is not harming cell structures at all, and that's that's that defines this very good reliability and longevity of glass glass products. I would myself never buy anything else than glass glass, and there's another aspect why glass glass has has broken through also in utility.
• 27:19
  Gunter Erfurt: I mean, I I don't know if anyone who is still using glass backsheet in large utility projects because you have bifaciality, which is by the way still still you know championed by by heterojunction. Well, that
• 27:34
  Tim Montague: brings up bifaciality, right? And and today I don't think Swift is planning to do perovskite on both sides of the cell, but that could happen in the future, right?
• 27:47
  Gunter Erfurt: Well, I mean, there are concepts to do bifacial products with, let's say, the classic tandem structure with the perovskite front and silicon top cell, or the other way round, bottom cell and top cell, and and still enjoy some bifaciality. It's it's a bit challenging with the current the ISC matching, but there are ideas how to do it, and I think there's also a necessity to provide bifaciality also at least in the long run, to products because at least the utility sector simply got used to to buy facial products, and you harvest simply from you know whatever you get back as an albedo, and this is this is also being factored in in the in the business cases in the levelized cost of electricity. So definitely something to be worked on and to be focused on.
• 28:46
  Gunter Erfurt: And by the way, also one of the one of the caveats, if I may say so, of of back contact solar cells. That's why I think back contact, as exciting as it looks like, but I have a hard time believing that this is going to be the mainstream technology for utility solar projects because of you know no bifaciality or at least lower bifaciality. The Maya Borgia heterojunction IPC cell there is even an idea how to make it bifacial, but it won't be as good as the classic heterojunction cell, which is almost 100% both sides.
• 29:26
  John Weaver: I think the the different products that are floating out there right now.
• 29:30
  John Weaver: Topcon, from my readings, shows that it's like 80% of you know major cell manufacturing. But for the first, maybe not the first time, but for a major time, I just saw, I'm trying to remember who did the upgrade.
• 29:46
  John Weaver: TCL maybe they're upgrading like 20 gigawatts, like a massive volume of Topcon to BC hard hardware right now, and I just thought that was really interesting because it's just interesting to watch how these cell technologies are moving and who's coming next? I mean, it's it's beyond my pay scale to deal with that stuff. But I, as a developer, as a contractor, we have a 1.8 megawatt rooftop, and we just bought our most efficient solar panel. It was over 23 percent. It was a top con from Canadian Solar, and I was just excited to be 23 percent. We actually went up 100 kW on our prior module, which was in the upper 20-ones, maybe 20-two, and it's it's neat to see these different things rolling out, seeing these bigger efficiencies, and and I'm just it's fun to watch. I actually met the founder of Canadian Solar recently. I was at a SNCC in China, and I was there with I was about to call Eckart Gurras, the owner of PV Magazine, Gunter, because you guys have a similar name. His last name Eckart and Erfert, whatever they start with letter E. So for me, that confuses me. And you're both Germans, so there's that too. But anyway, but yes, continue, Tim.
• 31:08
  Tim Montague: Well, I'm always I'm always curious. You know, where do you see the solar PV market? You know, how do you see it evolving? And and let's fast forward three to five years.
• 31:23
  Tim Montague: Swift Solar is producing commercial solar panels. Who is the target audience for this tandem technology?
• 31:33
  Gunter Erfurt: So I think let's maybe let's maybe start with my view on how this will all globally. Evolve or develop and continue. I think that the U.S.
• 31:44
  Gunter Erfurt: industry policy scheme, together also with trade policies and tariffs and so on and so forth, has really been strong enough to unlock, you know, the capacity-at least the nameplate capacity, that's now installed in the U.S. With you know what I'm hearing and seeing is some some 50 gigawatt or so, which is which is said to be nameplate.
• 32:15
  Gunter Erfurt: I'm not sure if it's all productive, but and look at where this all began when before the IRA was introduced, so it's pretty much a story, an amazing story, going from you know maybe five to 100 It's not from from zero to 100 There have been a few, and including for solar, of course. But that's absolutely breathtaking in such a short time. I.e. I believe. if the right measures are being imposed to bring such an important industry back, that by the way you know helps with resilience topics and energy is a warranty for this future energy solar energy, but it also simply creates jobs, domestic jobs. I mean, that's also something that that is we we shall never forget about. So that's that's absolutely amazing to see how the U.S. did it. Nevertheless, there's still an enormous gap in between this domestic module manufacturing capacity and cell production, and I think it's a it's a it's a it's a factor of 10 in between. So maybe five gigawatt nameplate in cell, and so I think that's exactly the opportunity that we see because the solar cell is actually the engine of the of the module, and it's also as as we already discussed in this in this podcast, super important value creator, if you if I may say so, and also helping, of course, driving levelized cost of electricity down. So that's why the opportunity is is definitely also in the in the cell business, and that's going to be something we will we will we will focus on. So what I don't expect when we continue hearing about the Swift story, is that we are departing from the idea making solar cells and also only focus on module, because then we would be probably more perceived in Me Too, also you know on the investor side. So this combination of strong cell and module experience now after this acquisition and together with Swift's strong experience in tandems is is the prerequisite to be successful. So, from my experience in how to enter into you know most long term agreements and bankable agreements, which are also exciting enough for investors, utility is absolutely key to to to be entered into, and also how we look when we look into the segmentation in the U.S. I mean, residential might be exciting, more exciting in terms of achievable pricing, but the volumes are of course much much smaller, and there's no such thing like long-term contracting or off-take agreements, take or pay, and that's why why I think we we will be have a we will be having a strong focus on on the utility sector and also in the combination with what we've discussed the quality and the longevity and the reliability, i.e. the bankability of the solar panel product is is going to be in our strong focus, and that's where we want to make utility solar customers happy.
• 35:32
  Gunter Erfurt: Which does not mean that we may not produce eventually also for for the residential market, but I think it's it's from from a planning point of view for a company that's you know scaling and starting up, this is the less attractive segment, I would say.
• 35:53
  John Weaver: There's recent headlines of I think Trina signing a contract for premium residential perovskite modules.
• 36:05
  John Weaver: and they, and I believe it was for New Zealand. So the premium New Zealand market residential they're selling into, and they're basing it on the same platform. They have a 900 watt, 29% perovskite tandem that they've been talking about as a module, a module level, 29% and so it seems like a good starter market. Utility scale people who are investing 100 million bucks in a power plant, they're going to have engineers and risk mitigation people who are going to be like, ah, we don't want to be on. The the testing testing group, but I I think it makes great sense. I would as a you know if I was a private person, well if I had a house, I live downtown in the giant apartment building, so I don't have a roof. But maybe when I get my balcony solar kit, I'll buy some Priv Scott modules. But if I was had a private house, I would experiment as a as a professional solar person. I would experiment with a module like that just to be able to talk about it in my company. And I, you know, I'm sure that there's going to be plenty of premium people who like buying whiz bang stuff in the U.S. So if if you know that Swift has about 10 kW of modules that they want to test on a residential project. Let us know, Gunter.
• 37:28
  John Weaver: We'll find some houses to put them on for you. No problem.
• 37:31
  John Weaver: We'll do. We'll
• 37:31
  Gunter Erfurt: do. And I mean, you know, the the way it works in in the utility solar sector is is super super professional.
• 37:39
  Gunter Erfurt: And I think there will not be an excuse also for you know a new technology like perovskite to shorten the process, and until you know you are trusted enough in terms of the of the bankability, we have to pass all these all these processes. And once you have this bankability achieved, then I think the risk is is never zero in life, but manageable. So, and that's what we want to do. But but again, you know, if we were to tell the market, hey, we are we are we are remaining in stealth, we are developing, we are doing our work, and then we will you know one day surprise the market with you know utility solar tandem product and try to sell it.
• 38:25
  Gunter Erfurt: That's not what we do. So the plan is to start producing single junction heterojunction with the ability in the in the in the in the secret place that I'm not disclosing. You know, putting in also a perovskite kind of upgrade, if I may say so, to you know seamlessly integrate it into this this process flow, and take all the learnings from you know the bankability work and process integration also into account, and you know continued a success story of a of a pretty reliable product. Also, when it comes to timnums,
• 39:07
  John Weaver: if you have secret stuff, don't tell me. I'll run my mouth. But you can tell Tim.
• 39:10
  John Weaver: Maybe he's from the Midwest.
• 39:13
  John Weaver: They're quiet people. They know how to keep secrets over there.
• 39:16
  John Weaver: Not me. I'll be I'll be tweeting it or I'm blue sky or some crap real fast. Don't worry. But
• 39:22
  Tim Montague: let me understand correctly, Gunter. Swift is going to produce a pure HJT traditional panel,
• 39:31
  Gunter Erfurt: yeah,
• 39:31
  Tim Montague: and then offer a variant with Prof Guides.
• 39:35
  Gunter Erfurt: You know, we we want to we want to take the opportunity or the benefit of the current market environment as quickly as possible. That's why I'm saying you know the sooner the better. We will we will implement this manufacturing. The the planning is in full swing. We are speaking with all suppliers needed and do the site selection process and you know do fast track everything that's needed for such a huge project. But we are preparing this place already for the perovskite era from day one, and once everything is ready and designed, and this this work has also, of course, started. You know that's Swift spread and bottle business, and now with the industrialization, and you know we have mechanical designers, electrical designers, we have module integration folks in the in the German Swift team, and so they are they are working now together with the Californian team and do all this planning and then we we will you know basically gradually move into the perovskite product era as as soon as it is ready and as soon as it is also you know as soon as we can sell it, and that this will only happen once we have achieved the bankability levels. I think there's a huge risk also to be too fast with this product because I think you know when when you just told me that Trina is offering something. I mean, you can you can buy single junction product with also super exciting efficiencies, and very likely I've I've I've not seen the datasheet of the Twiner product, but I would presume that in back contact module got the better reliability data compared to a tandem one, and if you are you know maybe selling a green banana into the market, that may also not help your your reputation. So that's why I'm saying we we need to we need to we need to complete a few things that the entire industry, not only Swift, before. Perovskites will be ready for for mass deployment.
• 41:47
  John Weaver: By the way, the module it's a TopCon. I'm looking at the article right now. It's a 29.2% module, TopCon, and and and that one.
• 41:53
  John Weaver: You know, so they're they're working on it their way. And so just to verify, Swift they're not. They're going to go straight from solar cells to modules, so both both lines, not just cells. So cells and modules is Swift's goal. Yes. Now, do you plan on selling cells, or are you going to keep them all internal? Is that still because there's a big market for solar cells in the U.S. right now.
• 42:26
  Gunter Erfurt: Yeah, that that I think that can be a consideration. Of course, we are we are currently in talks with a number of customers already on on the you know long term offtake agreement side, and and we know that there's a strong sell demand. Yeah, and I think also many strategic considerations by one or the other player, and also concerns about the stability of the current supply chains. And I mean, we just need to be, you know, need to keep our eyes open on what's happening globally.
• 43:00
  Gunter Erfurt: And I, you know, sometimes I'm thinking, what's actually happening to this to this industry, and of course also more over to this world. But let's let's stick to the solar industry if there's if there's any escalation in the China Taiwan conflict. What what what's happening? You know, are we are we doing business as usual with these supply chains, I have a I have a hard time to believe it. So that's why I I again think, even though it came with a lot of pain for the U.S.
• 43:29
  Gunter Erfurt: solar industry, I know that when you know these import restrictions and tariffs kicked in. But what I really admire about what what's happened what happened in the U.S. versus what's not happening in Europe is that I sometimes think and feel and see that the U.S. solar industry was maybe not happy about it, but was willing to accept to go through this, you know, challenging times of Montague supply restrictions, pricing issues whatsoever. But now there's a domestic industry that that, including now also Hemlock's wafer plant and and other projects that I'm hearing about that would also like to you know fill the gaps, including us. So that's you know and and whenever a company is is doing their own strategic planning and looking ahead, what might happen in the next within the next five years? Then I think a domestic source of solar cells should be, you know, on their list as well. And of course, we are absolutely willing to discuss this. It
• 44:35
  Tim Montague: seems essential, honestly, for for the U.S. to have a stable solar industry that we have robust cell manufacture, and we have I don't know half a dozen companies pursuing this. Only only a couple have actually achieved cell manufacture. How many is that, Gunter or John? Three maybe. Yeah, 3234,
• 45:02
  John Weaver: Yeah, I mean you're right. There's only two cells.
• 45:04
  John Weaver: Two cells. Two cells. So
• 45:06
  Gunter Erfurt: never Canadian solar. Yeah, yeah. Canadian.
• 45:09
  Gunter Erfurt: Yeah, I think you know the the difficulty is a solar solar production is. You know this is a semiconductor device.
• 45:20
  Gunter Erfurt: Sometimes people look at it. You know it's a it's a large, simple semiconductor diode, but it's a it is a semiconductor device, and structures are getting more and more complex. Interface engineering, and now we do perovskites in a couple of years. I I personally don't think, and you know I I don't want to get on anyone's case, and but my personal conviction is that opposite to a Montague factory, a cell line you cannot simply you know have this vision. Buy a turnkey line that you know Chinese a Chinese company installs, and then you and then you you you you switch it on and run it. This is not how it works. Not in SolarCell.
• 46:05
  Gunter Erfurt: You need to have expertise, and you also need to have IP. I mean, you know, look at this these Topcon debates and you know first Solos approaches towards the the the Trade Commission and and all these all these processes that tells us that also the IP is going to be an asset and and and here we go again, you know with with with this with this concept of Joel and tim to acquire this package because it's the strongest in the West in heterojunction and Topcons it's. All in China, maybe with the exception of you know Tedrosan's heritage that's now owned by Prisola. It is
• 46:53
  John Weaver: you know this bigger, and I'm somebody who argues against the tariffs because I get mad at them because as a developer it's like man, and as a person who's a climate change guy, it's like in the United States, for every cent per kilowatt hour that we add by adding 1020, cents per watt for modules, that means more gas capacity is going to run because we don't have laws against gas. We have an open market that's priced on cents per kilo wholesale market rights. How and so it's a stress to watch this occur. But it, you know, it's to see the way the IRA has done stuff. It has created a carrot that a decade of tariffs did not create because Obama put the first tariff in place against the Chinese for stealing from you guys for stealing from Solar World, the general. I remember all that research and seeing it when it came back out in 2012 or 14, and we had a decade of tariffs and they didn't do anything. But then the way the IRA was structured, it just caused stuff to pop. And now though, with the way the IRA is structured and it's motivating people on the back end with the tariffs because of the fact that we still have the inflation, the 30% 40% tax credit in place. It makes it agreeable. When this tax credit goes away, though, and this is something you guys at SWIFT are going to have to start pushing on. I know you're not a giant company, but when that tax credit goes away, the domestic content adder stops becoming worth anything, and the world is going to change again.
• 48:34
  John Weaver: So you guys have to be on your toes with how these dynamics of tariffs, import tariffs, and this and these layers go. And it's it is a challenge. You're right in that we just we kind of dealt with it and we kept going and we're pushing. You know, people complain. They say, "Oh, the the U.S. solar market's so expensive. You know, we can't.
• 48:52
  John Weaver: You know, they're like, "What are you guys doing over there?
• 48:55
  John Weaver: We have a lot of extra costs that the rest of the world doesn't have on their solar. I mean, people are building solar in India for 70 cents, 60 cents a watt. I buy panels. I'm buying. I'm doing a project. I'm bidding for Harvard right now, and they have a very specific roof. We're paying 50-five cents for panels for that roof. There are people installing whole projects for 50-five cents. So it's it's a stress. It's a stress to stare at and think about it, and and and I mean, we're a different market with with revenue, but it's it's just a stress to see it. Yeah,
• 49:29
  Gunter Erfurt: yeah. So so maybe two comments on this one. I would agree that 55 is I mean maybe good for the panel maker or for the for the for the distributor for the distributor exactly. Yeah. But I I don't think that this is necessarily a price that needs to be achieved long term to survive. I don't think that the you know a U.S.
• 49:51
  Gunter Erfurt: based cost structure is is that bad that you need to ask for such such high prices. I mean, residential is a different ball game. I understand this, but what we also need to take into consideration, at least strategically, and and I also understand that you know people developing projects may look at their specific project, but it is an illusion that China is producing modules at the prices they are selling them, and I mean the the European example is the best. Is the best to watch.
• 50:23
  Gunter Erfurt: You can still buy a product here, even at small scale. You know, 100 megawatt or so, and you pay FOB. You pay maybe 10 cents, 11 cents still today, dollar cents. I guarantee you, the Chinese make these products without taking into consideration that they have also underabsorption in their factories because they are not fully loaded anymore, let's take the underabsorption out of it. I I would say, rock bottom cost structure in China is 15 cents, not below the real one. You know, I mean they are selling polysilicon at four four bucks per kg. You know, look at what Waco and and Hemlock do. It is physically impossible to to produce this. This is all manipulated with you know how they manipulate their currency.
• 51:12
  Gunter Erfurt: This is manipulated by how they are pouring 4% of their GDP into industry subsidies. It's about three times higher than the average Western countries do, and they do this to own markets.
• 51:27
  Gunter Erfurt: And I think it will there will be an equilibrium also in the U.S. That's that's my conviction. So the the more gigawatt scale factories do do up come up and running, of course there will be. Also, you know, economies of scale, and that will be beneficial. But I also tell you there is something that amazes me about the U.S. at least the utility market, which is impossible to be achieved in Europe. That's how your market is being designed. I know projects of I know of projects where IPPs are selling these contracts for 20 years and more, unthinkable in Europe. In Europe, you can be happy if you sign a five years IPP. And what financiers are doing, of course, they put the rest, the risk for the remainder of the lifetime of the of the project, which is then 1520, years, also into the financing costs because they don't know what interest rates will be and so on and so forth, and so that's why the resulting levelized cost of electricity for at least utility solar is not so much different in the U.S. and versus Europe, even though you you you if you have a strong supply chain management in your company, you you you buy single digit prices in terms of cent per watt peak from the Chinese for European projects, but still the SOEs won't be better because of the design of the market, and you know it's I think it's it looks well that tax credit
• 53:00
  John Weaver: helps that 30 40% tax credit. I mean, and the accelerated depreciation. You know, when the tax equity guys come in, they chop 50 cents, 50% off the project cost right up front, and that's that's it right there. So it's, you know, we take away by adding the tariffs, and so we use that to stabilize the manufacturing market in the U.S. And then we give back though with the tax credit, so it's like this this balance. It's I mean I I look at the solar module and battery manufacturing sort of like a human body almost, like the mitochondria, the powerhouse of the cell that makes batteries.
• 53:40
  John Weaver: And then I don't know I don't know what to parallel the skin to like the skin maybe a solar cell, but that doesn't make electricity. But all these pieces, it feels like it feels like every country. And I know Jenny Chase from Bloomberg. She says it's a terrible business to be in to manufacture because of the Chinese because they're beating the hell out of it. But it still feels like we saw what happened in the Middle East just now. I mean, there is a terrible war, and the price of energy around the world is being felt.
• 54:06
  John Weaver: And so, to have these resources distributed, like distributed solar with distributed manufacturing, that feels more like the human species in the future versus one place in one region dominating our energy and having such an outsized geopolitical effect. I mean, at minimum, you know, I went to school for political science, so I I do want to see solar distributed, but I want to see solar built first, and it's a hard challenge. It's like, how do we go back and forth? How do we make both happen? How do we?
• 54:39
  John Weaver: I mean, 20-2000 people just died from a heat wave in Europe, we need to build some solar. We need to build some wind, and we need to balance out these tariffs and construction. It's true, big stuff, big stuff. And you are building it, which is cool as hell. Sorry, because maybe,
• 54:55
  Gunter Erfurt: maybe, maybe, maybe also one interesting development I currently see, which also totally supports domestic cell manufacturing in the U.S. and hopefully also in Europe one day, which is how we are currently exploring space again. You know, with AI data centers and communication things, and of course also to some degree military, you know, spacecraft, and they are all solar powered, and it won't happen with three five gallium arsenide semiconductors. It won't happen because the supply chain is 100% controlled by the Chinese with gallium, and these cells are awfully expensive, like you know 300 $400 per watt peak solar cell, and so what.
• 55:44
  Gunter Erfurt: what what what you might have heard in the past? It's been public also when when when I've been at Meyerburger we we've signed a deal with Celestial from Tempi and produced silicon-based space cells in Germany. So you you know there's there's currently also a development into this super interesting you know companies like Celestial focusing on it and that's also something I mean you know would we would we all believe that the U.S. military or you know the German military would buy solar cells in China to equip their satellites. I mean that's nonsense, you know.
• 56:25
  Gunter Erfurt: And that's another reason why we have to have this technology in the West, in in in embedded in our economies, and it it creates so many jobs. The the former Volkswagen CEO Herbert Dees, who introduced the EV. Strategy to Volkswagen, he once said that he strongly believes that the number of people working in the solar manufacturing industry will outperform in terms of the number the number of people working in the car making by far. And and you just said it, John. You know we we are still in in in our kind of industry's infancy in terms of the volumes, even though they are they are already super huge. But there will be much much more because once we are converting also the heat part, which is you know still dominated by fossil fuel burning, into electrically powered systems. That's actually where the the huge demand of electrical energy is coming from, and that's gonna that's gonna triple the the Earth's demand for electricity. And this is I'm I'm absolutely convinced it's this is going to be produced by solar and wind, and not so much by nuclear and fusion.
• 57:48
  Tim Montague: Absolutely, yeah.
• 57:48
  Tim Montague: We have to remember that we're going to triple, maybe quadruple, the amount of electricity we consume, and the lowest, fastest cost way-you know, the the cheapest and fastest way to achieve that is wind, solar, and batteries. I have nothing against nuclear fundamentally, but it just is not time effective. And but same here, you know.
• 58:09
  Gunter Erfurt: I'm I'm a physicist. I'm I'm I'm not against these technologies. I'm just looking at from a techno-economical point of view, and it won't be fast enough to help the problem that John described.
• 58:22
  Tim Montague: Well, it's it's sad, but we've we've come to the end of our hour, and I know
• 58:26
  John Weaver: I know it's two already, man.
• 58:28
  Tim Montague: Really great to see you enter airfare. If you're in
• 58:31
  John Weaver: Boston, if you're in the U.S. we buy you beers.
• 58:33
  John Weaver: Let us know. Fantastic. Will you be
• 58:36
  Tim Montague: will you be at RE Plus in at in Las Vegas in November?
• 58:41
  Gunter Erfurt: Not decided, but potentially also looking into joining Finlay's Collove's show on the on the solar manufacturing U.S. in September, and of course I'm I'm I'm traveling you know more and more regularly also to to the Bay to meet with the with this. What is what is
• 58:59
  Tim Montague: Finley's event?
• 59:01
  Gunter Erfurt: It's about solar solar manufacturing in the U.S.
• 59:03
  Gunter Erfurt: So he's done it. He's done it always where you know we we had the markets developing most interestingly enough. So you know in Malaysia, then we had an event in we did an event in Europe twice, and I think this year is first manufacturing event in the U.S. but I'm not sure. Could could no, it is the first. Second, it's the first.
• 59:26
  Gunter Erfurt: So this
• 59:27
  John Weaver: is the first year solar manufacturing. It's based in Austin. It's being run between PV Magazine and Finlay.
• 59:34
  John Weaver: Finlay is running it because he knows everything about everything about solar manufacturing. He's got some great lists he's been putting out recently, and PV Magazine will be in Austin, and Tim, if you want to go, I'm sure I know some people. I can get you a ticket. Well, yeah, I'm very. I might be going. I might be going. I'm very
• 59:52
  Tim Montague: interested in going, and I've been trying to get a hold of Finley. I saw him at Intersolar, and he promised me an interview this spring when his report was out. He kept saying, "Well, my report is pending, or book, or I don't know what it is, but here he is.
• 1:00:04
  Tim Montague: He's ghosting me very, very methodically. So I hope he he hears this and and responds. But yeah, let's let's connect in Austin, Texas. I love Austin.
• 1:00:17
  Gunter Erfurt: All right, sounds good.
• 1:00:19
  Tim Montague: All right. Well, thank you, Gunter Air Fort, with Swift Solar and John Weaver, the commercial solar guy. We'll see you again in two weeks, John.
• 1:00:26
  Tim Montague: And with that, I'll say let's grow solar and storage. Check out all of our content at CleanPowerHour.com. Gunter, where can our listeners find you?
• 1:00:38
  Gunter Erfurt: Well, currently in Germany, but traveling
• 1:00:43
  John Weaver: LinkedIn. Find them on LinkedIn. Gunther posts on LinkedIn. LinkedIn, you
• 1:00:48
  Gunter Erfurt: can you you can you can put my my my LinkedIn link maybe yes in this podcast.
• 1:00:56
  Tim Montague: And John, how can our listeners find you?
• 1:01:00
  John Weaver: commercialsolarguy.com We got a nice contact form. You can call me. You can come to Cambridge. I'll buy you a beer.
• 1:01:06
  John Weaver: That type of stuff. I'm easy to find. I'm always on Blue Sky too. Tim's near Chicago, though.
• 1:01:09
  John Weaver: You got to go to Chicago if you want to find Tim. Champaign, Illinois.
• 1:01:15
  Tim Montague: Okay, with that, I'll say let's grow solar and storage, and let's look forward to some commercial perovskite solar panels in the market soon.
• 1:01:21
  Tim Montague: Take care, everybody. Thanks for being here.
• 1:01:26
  Gunter Erfurt: Thank you so much.