BIPV

What is a Building Integrated Photovoltaic or a BIPV?

Building Integrated Photovoltaics serves more than one purpose. BIPVs produce electricity by the piezoelectric effect and serve as protection for any structure. 

BIPVs are installed to provide shed, block sunlight, and give a modern look to any building, all this while producing electricity from sunlight.

Where is a BIPV used?

A BIPV is integrated into a structure like conventional buildings. BIPVs replace glass windows with Solar windows, parking shed rooftops with solar roofs and solar shades in place of translucent covers. All these changes make the look of any structure modern while being extremely useful.

Types of Building Integrated Photovoltaics

Solar panels are silicon-based photovoltaic cells that produce electricity from sunlight. With micro adjustments according to the application, these cells transform into BIPVs. Based on various applications, there are broadly four types of BIPVs.

Image credit: Research Gate

• Solar-Facades: Solar Facades’ integration in building structures keeps the noise and air pollution out and gives any building a visual identity. This all while producing green energy.

• Solar-Window: Solar windows find their application both in residential and commercial properties. These windows look like any other windows but with solar modules.

• Solar-Roofs: Solar roofs like that of Tesla Energy in the USA are becoming popular. In conventional rooftops, these solar tiles replace asphalt tiles. Every tile acts as an individual cell and connects in series to generate electricity.

• PV-Sunshades: Parking lot sheds are the best example of PV-Sunshades. Additionally, these shades protect buildings from direct sunlight.

How does a BIPV work?

BIPVs use opaque or transparent solar cells connected in series to each other to give a substantial amount of current output. These photovoltaics are located in the portion of the building exposed to the sun the most.

What are big manufacturing brands of BIPVs?

Tesla Energy is one major brand in the USA backed by Elon Musk. They manufacture solar cell tiles for residential rooftops. Customers get a variety of tiles according to the required strength and size.

Some other contributors in this niche are:

• D2solar
• Mysolar USA  
• Omnis Power USA Inc  
• Redwood Renewables
• Skyco Skylights
• Solaria
• Sonali Solar USA

Manufacturers

In the simplest terms, manufacturing is the process of producing actual goods or items/products through the use of raw materials, human labour, use of machinery, tools and other processes such as chemical formulation. This process usually starts with product designing and raw material selection, turning them into an actual product output. 

Solar Products Manufacturers and Factories

In terms of solar, manufacturing encompasses the fabrication or production of materials across the solar market chain. The most common product being manufactured by solar companies are the solar photovoltaic (PV) panels, which are made with several subcomponents such as solar wafers, cells, glass, back sheets, and frames. Before a solar panel comes into life, it will undergo a lot of processes, from designing, modelling, choosing what raw materials to use and then assembling them all to make the final product.

More Than Just Solar Panels

Aside from the solar panels, solar companies have many other manufactured products that are required to make solar energy systems work smoothly, like solar inverters, batteries, combiner boxes, and racking and tracking structures.

Having a solar manufacturing sector makes a big difference in supplying affordable solar energy in different areas. Aside from maintaining the rising domestic and global demand for cleaner and renewable energy, they also help the economy grow, particularly the solar industry. If you are in search of a reliable solar manufacturing company, checking out our solar outsourcing company, SolarFeeds, would help you get easy access to reliable information, news, data and a list of solar manufacturers that can help you with solar products.

Guatemala

Brief scrutiny of Guatemala’s budding solar market

Guatemala is the second-largest power market in Central America. The country’s overall energy capacity is quite impressive. Nonetheless, the government of Guatemala has been working on improving installed solar capacity.

As of 2017, the Central American nation had a total installed solar capacity of 99 Megawatts. This was a massive achievement for the country, considering that in 2010, its total installed capacity was only 1 Megawatt.  There are no recent statistics concerning Guatemala’s solar capacity in 2021. However, studies show that the solar market has continued to grow steadily.

Currently, most people residing in Guatemala’s rural areas use rooftop photovoltaic panels to power their homes. Off-grid solar projects, especially those in rural Guatemala, enjoy lots of support from non-profit organizations and institutions. If this support continues to grow, solar installers and other photovoltaic professionals should expect limitless opportunities in Guatemala’s budding solar market.

Guatemala’s solar equipment manufacturing and supply capacity

There are several local and foreign solar equipment manufacturers and suppliers serving the Guatemalan solar market. Solar panels and batteries are the most common equipment available in this nascent solar market. Still, you don’t necessarily have to move from place to place requesting quotes if you need a solar equipment supplier.

Solarfeeds.com, home to several leading equipment suppliers that serve the Guatemalan market, offers a convenient alternative. Just go to our inquiry page and request quotes. We will get back to you with exciting quotes faster than you can imagine.

Ports and logistics in Guatemala  

 Guatemala boasts of a total of 5 ports located on the Pacific and the Atlantic sides. Apart from that, it is endowed with good transport infrastructure. Fundamentally, the country has everything you need if you decide to import solar equipment from established overseas markets.