Post #4
Monday, May 21st
Today was my first of many days actually going into the headquarters of First Solar in Tempe, Arizona. Right when I arrived, I felt very welcomed. Though the people here are professional and focused, they are also friendly and compassionate. Along with serious discussions about corporate communication, human resources, and solar power, I also had conversations about soccer, college, and music. It was just a nice reminder that beneath our careers and education, we're all still people who like to enjoy ourselves and relate to one another. In order to uphold confidentiality standard and policies at First Solar the names that I mention in these blog posts will not be the real names. Additionally, certain sensitive information about the company may be omitted.
I followed Sheila around a lot today, but my most important conversation probably happened with a man named Michael. Michael's official title at first solar is "engineer with global customer service". He helped explain to me a lot about the technology behind solar panels, and what separates First Solar from other solar companies. Of course, since I didn't take several years of engineering courses like he did, he had to simplify the information a little bit so I could understand it. The main concept of a solar panel is as follows: by absorbing energy from the sun, you can capture photons (electrons) and push them through the positive side of a semiconductor into the negative side and through a transmission line to supply energy. Most solar energy companies use silicon to make their solar panels. They have to take silicon and splice it down to its component parts and use those to make solar panels. First Solar instead, has created a special thin film to spray the technology on the module. It's kind of like a recipe. And like many recipes, the formula behind it is very secret so he couldn't get into a ton of detail on how it works. Another key thing that we talked a lot about was how streamlined First Solar's manufacturing process is. They're 1 of 2 solar companies around the world that has every part of the module done in one place at a time. Instead of shipping the silicon here and there, and breaking it down like this in that place, and so on, First solar completes the whole process in one place by the same people. He said this makes the product more uniform and consistent. The example he gave is as follows: you'd rather have one person make all 4 of the tires on your car than 4 people in 4 different locations. First Solar has also been able to cut down costs on their panels by automating a lot of their process, thus making the product more efficient. Another big thing Michael and I talked about was the efficiency of a solar panel. First Solar prides itself on having a 17% efficiency rate in its panels. By the time solar energy hits our air, it has 1000 radiance (watts per meter squared). If a solar panel had 10% efficiency, it would be able to absorb 100 radiance. In this example, 170 watts per meter squared could be absorbed by that 1000 radiance number. Within this radiance, there are two types of sunlight to be absorbed by the panels. There's direct sunlight diffused sunlight. Diffused sunlight is when the light scatters, which is something that's bound to happen in any environment. A small amount of dust alone will cause sunlight to scatter and not directly hit a point. Though silicon is a little bit more energy efficient with the direct sunlight, first solar panels with their special formula are far better at absorbing diffused sunlight. These are some of the main ideas and processes we talked about. This one of the most important conversations I had today, and it gave me a good foundation for the rest of the experience. I look forward to seeing how I can build more knowledge off of what I learned today.
Today was my first of many days actually going into the headquarters of First Solar in Tempe, Arizona. Right when I arrived, I felt very welcomed. Though the people here are professional and focused, they are also friendly and compassionate. Along with serious discussions about corporate communication, human resources, and solar power, I also had conversations about soccer, college, and music. It was just a nice reminder that beneath our careers and education, we're all still people who like to enjoy ourselves and relate to one another. In order to uphold confidentiality standard and policies at First Solar the names that I mention in these blog posts will not be the real names. Additionally, certain sensitive information about the company may be omitted.
I followed Sheila around a lot today, but my most important conversation probably happened with a man named Michael. Michael's official title at first solar is "engineer with global customer service". He helped explain to me a lot about the technology behind solar panels, and what separates First Solar from other solar companies. Of course, since I didn't take several years of engineering courses like he did, he had to simplify the information a little bit so I could understand it. The main concept of a solar panel is as follows: by absorbing energy from the sun, you can capture photons (electrons) and push them through the positive side of a semiconductor into the negative side and through a transmission line to supply energy. Most solar energy companies use silicon to make their solar panels. They have to take silicon and splice it down to its component parts and use those to make solar panels. First Solar instead, has created a special thin film to spray the technology on the module. It's kind of like a recipe. And like many recipes, the formula behind it is very secret so he couldn't get into a ton of detail on how it works. Another key thing that we talked a lot about was how streamlined First Solar's manufacturing process is. They're 1 of 2 solar companies around the world that has every part of the module done in one place at a time. Instead of shipping the silicon here and there, and breaking it down like this in that place, and so on, First solar completes the whole process in one place by the same people. He said this makes the product more uniform and consistent. The example he gave is as follows: you'd rather have one person make all 4 of the tires on your car than 4 people in 4 different locations. First Solar has also been able to cut down costs on their panels by automating a lot of their process, thus making the product more efficient. Another big thing Michael and I talked about was the efficiency of a solar panel. First Solar prides itself on having a 17% efficiency rate in its panels. By the time solar energy hits our air, it has 1000 radiance (watts per meter squared). If a solar panel had 10% efficiency, it would be able to absorb 100 radiance. In this example, 170 watts per meter squared could be absorbed by that 1000 radiance number. Within this radiance, there are two types of sunlight to be absorbed by the panels. There's direct sunlight diffused sunlight. Diffused sunlight is when the light scatters, which is something that's bound to happen in any environment. A small amount of dust alone will cause sunlight to scatter and not directly hit a point. Though silicon is a little bit more energy efficient with the direct sunlight, first solar panels with their special formula are far better at absorbing diffused sunlight. These are some of the main ideas and processes we talked about. This one of the most important conversations I had today, and it gave me a good foundation for the rest of the experience. I look forward to seeing how I can build more knowledge off of what I learned today.
Thanks for sharing- sorry I got behind in my reading!
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