Positive news from a Unisolar partner.
Press Release Source: Solar Integrated Technologies, Inc.
Solar Integrated Completes 39 Solar Projects in 2005
Tuesday January 24, 3:00 pm ET
Estimates Annual Global Market for Industrial Solar Roofs Exceeds $100 Billion
LOS ANGELES, Jan. 24 /PRNewswire/ -- Solar Integrated Technologies, Inc. (AIM: SIT.LN), a leading provider of commercial Building Integrated Photovoltaic (BIPV) roofs, announced today that it completed 39 industrial solar roofing projects in 2005, bringing the Company's total installed projects to 58 aggregating more than 5 MW of installed generating capacity. These projects, installed in Arizona, California, Nevada, New York, Texas, Germany and Spain, represent a range of industries and customers, including Coca-Cola, Frito-Lay, Honeywell, ProLogis, San Diego City Schools and Wal-Mart.
"The significant increase in our install base of customer sites in 2005 is very exciting. Our sales momentum and first-to-market advantage strongly positions us to accelerate our push into the large global market for Solar Integrated's BIPV roofing solutions," commented Jon Slangerup, Chief Executive Officer of Solar Integrated. "We estimate that the annual addressable market for industrial solar roofs exceeds $100 billion, based on current market estimates for non-residential roofing."
Until the recent introduction of Solar Integrated's commercial BIPV roofing products, the application of solar panels for large area low-slope roofs was limited due to the weight of traditional rigid crystalline solar panels and the roof penetrations required to secure these heavy panels. To address these building limitations, Solar Integrated developed an innovative BIPV roofing product that combines lightweight roofing material with flexible solar panels. Solar Integrated's unique solar roof panel weighs only 12 oz per square foot and lies flat on existing roof top facilities without exceeding roof loading limitations. By comparison, traditional crystalline solar panels weigh 8 lbs per square foot and often require roof modifications before installation. In addition, unlike 94% of other solar technologies, the Solar Integrated amorphous BIPV product does not use purified silicon as a raw ingredient, but rather uses silane gas, which requires only trace amounts of silicon. Therefore, Solar Integrated's amorphous BIPV products are not constrained by global silicon supply and pricing. These key product characteristics are enabling the Company to unlock the potential of industrial roofing as a nascent market for on-site solar power generation.
"By creating a viable solar roofing solution for "big box" industrial buildings, our customers have the potential to generate on-site renewable power, while simultaneously reducing peak energy demands on the grid and reducing dependence on fossil fuel-based energy production," continued Mr. Slangerup. "For example, by the year 2010, California is projected to have approximately 3.6 billion square feet of low slope industrial roof space. If this space was used to host our BIPV solution, California's industrial roof tops could generate 9 GW of renewable power, equal to about 15% of the State's peak electricity demand. Extrapolating this over the world's available industrial roofing real estate creates an extraordinary renewable energy opportunity."
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