Dec 10 2010
Solutia, a specialty materials manufacturing company, declared its proposal of expanding the operations of its Suzhou, China, manufacturing facility by the last part of the year 2011.
The company proposes to add extra production lines for the manufacture of its Vistasolar ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA) encapsulant. The capacity expansion is in sequence to an earlier announcement by the company to incorporate the manufacture of EVA encapsulants at its Suzhou facility.
The Vistasolar encapsulants presently produced at Solutia's factory in Dietenheim, Germany, comprise new thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) films, and ultrafast-curing EVA films that do not need a curing process. The company also produces Saflex polyvinyl butyral (PVB) interlayers, which are utilized to capsulize thin film PV solar cells offering increased power conversion efficiency and sturdiness. The company with over 100 years of collective encapsulation procedure proficiency is the lone provider of PVB, TPU and EVA encapsulants.
Tim Wessel, Solutia's Advanced Interlayers division’s president and general manager, said that in 2010 the photovoltaic market witnessed good growth and most of the photovoltaic modules are produced in Asian countries. He added that his company will persist in investing in lucrative solar encapsulant solutions to meet the growing demand of Asia-Pacific region and the other countries of the world.