[RE-wrenches] Made in the USA WAS: Picking a Quality Chinese PV Module

Bill Loesch solar1online at charter.net
Tue Jul 20 04:40:03 PDT 2010


Peter,

FYI, BZ Products, USA manufacturer of fine MPPT and PWM charge controllers
(also located in Saint Louis, Missouri) has no Chinese manufactured boards.
I know of other fine USA solar and related manufacturers who also adhere to
a made in the USA policy. Bravo Frank, et al.

The idea that the US is still even in the top tier of engineering today is
open to serious discussion.

What the US has mastered today is world class marketing, we are no longer a
manufacturing powerhouse, neither can we design/engineer the stuff, but man
can we sell it. We sold soda machines to replace the milk machines in
schools and now have more obese kids than any other first world nation.
Kudos marketing mavens.

Bill Loesch, P.E.
Solar 1 - Saint Louis Solar
314 631 1094

For those of you who have not seen Story of Stuff, it is a 20 minute
animation of the pitfalls of marketing, inappropriate resource management,
worker exploitation, and other areas. I recommend it.

StoryofStuff.org


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Peter Parrish" <peter.parrish at calsolareng.com>
To: "'RE-wrenches'" <re-wrenches at lists.re-wrenches.org>
Sent: Monday, July 19, 2010 7:28 PM
Subject: Re: [RE-wrenches] Picking a Quality Chinese PV Module


> Bob-O
>
> Your iPhone/Blackberry/Droid was mfgd in China, so was your flat panel
> monitor (no, not your TV, your PC monitor), so was your Xantrex inverter,
> virtually every printed circuit board in every piece of electronics you
own.
> Our only hope as a country is to be the best in engineering and stay that
> way. Love has nothing to do with it.
>
> - Peter
>
> Peter T. Parrish, Ph.D., President
> California Solar Engineering, Inc.
> 820 Cynthia Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90065
> CA Lic. 854779, NABCEP Cert. 031806-26
> peter.parrish at calsolareng.com
> Ph 323-258-8883, Mobile 323-839-6108, Fax 323-258-8885
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: re-wrenches-bounces at lists.re-wrenches.org
> [mailto:re-wrenches-bounces at lists.re-wrenches.org] On Behalf Of Bob-O
> Schultze
> Sent: Monday, July 19, 2010 4:30 PM
> To: RE-wrenches
> Subject: Re: [RE-wrenches] Picking a Quality Chinese PV Module
>
> If you like buying your oil from the Mideast and think that's a good idea,
> then you will love buying your PV from China.
>
> On Jul 19, 2010, at 3:14 PM, Peter Parrish wrote:
>
> We normally take a very conservative approach to accepting new product,
> whether they be PV modules or inverters. As a result for example we never
> gave SunTech much of chance back in 2004, although I must say that our
> evaluation of SunTech was exacerbated by a terrible relationship with
their
> SoCal distributor.
>
> I believe that we have to jump in and take a hard look at the PV modules
> coming out of China from an engineering point of view. Perhaps the
> discussion will transition off list, but for now I think that we should
have
> a broad discussion as to HOW to evaluate these modules.
>
> (1) UL and its sister organizations test for safety, no? What are the
> European equivalents to UL and how do they differ in any important
respect?
>
> (2) Here in California, for grid-tied systems we need CEC listing, which
> normally comes from a NRTL (acronym correct?). I believe that today the
CEC
> listing is based on NOCT and temperature coefficient of power. I
understand
> that TUV is also recognized as a lab by CEC. But for utility scale
projects,
> we won't need CEC listing.
>
> Beyond that, how do we know if it is a prudent move to purchase 20-50 kW
of
> an off-brand for a limited scale installation?
>
> I heard that Canadian Solar cells were manufactured from "Grade B"
silicon,
> compared to "Grade A". What can that possibly mean? I spent 8 hours on the
> floor at InterSolar a few days ago, and I didn't get the same answer from
> any two Chinese PV manufacturers--about of any technical question beyond
> what one can garner from the cut sheet.
>
> Without having any better idea, I have asked one manufacturer to supply us
> with two each of their "240 W to 270 W Class" modules (2 of poly and 2 of
> single crystal). We plan to subject give them a VERY careful inspection in
> house and then devise some sort of mid-term (4 month) test under Coachella
> Valley conditions.
>
> What are other folks doing?
>
> - Peter
>
>
> Peter T. Parrish, Ph.D., President
> California Solar Engineering, Inc.
> 820 Cynthia Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90065
> CA Lic. 854779, NABCEP Cert. 031806-26
> peter.parrish at calsolareng.com
> Ph 323-258-8883, Mobile 323-839-6108, Fax 323-258-8885
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