Dana Hull covers clean technology and energy policy for the San Jose Mercury News. She often writes about electric vehicles, the smart grid, the solar industry and California energy policy, from RPS goals to Gov. Jerry Brown's big dreams for distributed generation.
The growing CIGS graveyard: Nanosolar liquidation auction
The CIGS graveyard is getting full.
Nanosolar, the aspiring solar manufacturer located in South San Jose’s Edenvale clean technology zone, is done. The company laid off 75 percent of its workforce in February. The San Jose facility is being closed and a “bulk and piecemeal global online auction” for the company’s assets is being held August 13th.
Nanosolar is one of several solar start-ups that tried to use CIGS — copper indium gallium selenide — instead of silicon for its solar cells and panels. The more famous CIGS player was Solyndra.
It made its solar cells in San Jose and assembled them into panels at its factory in Luckenwalde, Germany. An un-named Swiss investor has bought that facility.
Eric Wesoff at Greentech Media has followed the Nanosolar saga closer than most.
Dana Hull covers clean technology and energy policy for the San Jose Mercury News. She often writes about electric vehicles, the smart grid, the solar industry and California energy policy, from RPS goals to Gov. Jerry Brown's big dreams for distributed generation.
