Every reporter Huang Xinlei and every editor Zhang Haini

As a "light chaser", Trina Solar (688599. Gao Jifan, chairman of the board of directors, has established the company's mission of "benefiting all mankind with solar energy", and has become a leading enterprise in the photovoltaic industry for more than 20 years.

On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the founding of the "Daily Economic News", Gao Jifan accepted an exclusive interview with the reporter of the "Daily Economic News" (hereinafter referred to as NBD). He said that technological innovation is an effective way to break the involution of the industry, and at the same time, technological innovation needs to be respected and protected.

Gao Jifan believes that photovoltaic technology is destined to enter the perovskite era, and the photoelectric conversion rate of Trina Solar's perovskite tandem cell laboratory has exceeded 34%, indicating that the photovoltaic industry will usher in a new breakthrough in photoelectric conversion rate.

NBD: Why did you choose to pursue a career in PV? Trina Solar has been developing for more than 20 years, what is your biggest insight?

Gao Jifan: I once aspired to be a scientist, and when I was a graduate student, I studied under Mr. Tang Aoqing, the "father of Chinese quantum chemistry", and many of my former classmates are now academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and outstanding scientific research workers.

During my studies, my grades were excellent, and my husband hoped that I could continue my studies, so he won me the opportunity to study for a Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley. However, I felt that only by applying what I learned and combining industry and scientific research could I better serve the society, so I chose to start a business after graduation.

In the early days of my business, I was always thinking about how to make a product that people could afford to use and benefit from. In 1997, when I received the "Million Solar Roof Plan" from then US President Clinton from my former classmates and inspired by the "Kyoto Protocol", I felt that photovoltaic products were the products that I had been striving for to benefit the masses, and the prospects of the photovoltaic market were limitless.

In December 1997, TRW was officially established to explore photovoltaic technology and industry. In 2002, TRW participated in the construction of the national "Bright Project" in Tibet, when the conditions were very difficult, many places in the local area were not connected to electricity and traffic, and the transportation of materials had to be carried by people and horses.

I and 18 colleagues of the company, in Tibet lasted 8 months to build 40 photovoltaic power stations, I still remember at night when the lights are on, people's excitement and joy, there is a Tibetan girl looking at the lights on, her eyes do not blink, that clear eyes make me unforgettable, let me feel that solar energy is really a huge effect on the people, at that moment I made up my mind to dedicate my life to solar energy. Later, after returning from Tibet, we further established our corporate mission of "using solar energy for the benefit of all mankind".

NBD: The PV industry has gone through many cyclical ups and downs over the past few decades, what choices have companies made?

Gao Jifan: I always remember what my teacher, Mr. Tang, said to me when I chose to start a business: "Once you decide, there is no turning back, no matter what difficulties and challenges you encounter in the future, you must persevere." "In the 27 years since its establishment, Trina Solar has experienced many ups and downs, and has gone through three major PV cycles, including the global financial crisis in 2008, and the anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations launched by the United States and Europe against China's PV industry in 2011.

The pain is tossing and turning in dilemmas again and again, how to make the right choice. Running a business is like a battlefield competition, and many of my contemporaries of photovoltaic entrepreneurs have not been able to persevere. Every time I encounter a difficult choice, I ask myself and the management of TRW two questions: First, is what TRW is doing now? Second, can TRW do the best it can do?

As long as one of the answers to the two questions is no, then even if there is a big temptation behind it, we must refuse to do it, for example, TRW did not choose to invest in upstream production capacity in the overheating stage of the industry before 2008, because I judged that the built and under construction production capacity was several times the market demand after returning from research in the United States at that time. It is also for the same reason that in the tide of industry expansion, Trina's upstream investment is also rational and moderately integrated, which not only ensures the safety of the supply chain, but also has good cost elasticity.

It is gratifying to see that after each passing cycle, Trina Solar has ushered in greater development. In 2009, I flew to Europe with the management team, visited more than 30 customers in 7 countries in a week, listened to the voices and needs of customers, and fully won the recognition of customers. After returning to China, I made up my mind to invest US$500 million to build a 500MW vertically integrated product production base, which was equivalent to the current 10GW~20GW integrated scale, and in the context of declining market demand at that time, Trina Solar achieved contrarian growth, with a growth rate of more than 100%, and became one of the top 10 in the industry from an industry catch-up.

In 2011, due to the "double dumping" (anti-dumping, anti-subsidy) and domestic overcapacity in Europe and the United States, the industry fell into a greater winter. In this case, other companies are still focusing on putting into production, but we foresee the coming of this cycle, so we will unswervingly engage in innovation and build a national key laboratory.

In 2012, in the face of the imbalance between supply and demand and the "double reversal", in the bleakest three years of the market, the whole industry is more difficult than now, only by insisting on innovation can we go further. In 2014, Trina's module shipments reached the first place in the world for the first time.

In the past 27 years, my biggest insight is that as an entrepreneur, you must be sincere, combine knowledge and action, endure loneliness, and withstand temptation. As a "light chaser", we must not forget our original intention, keep our mission in mind, insist on innovation and struggle, and we will always be young.

NBD: Trina Solar achieved revenue of 42.968 billion yuan and net profit of 526 million yuan in the first half of 2024, which is in a good position compared with its peers. How is the company's overseas market development?

Gao Jifan: In addition to the cost elasticity of moderately integrated capacity construction mentioned earlier, the most important reason for Trina's performance in the first half of the year is that it is positioned as a unique service provider of photovoltaic storage smart energy system solutions. Different from the traditional sales-based and market-oriented enterprises, Tianhe has always adhered to the customer-oriented, demand-based service improvement, and service to enhance demand.

In the first half of this year, in addition to the 25.9% increase in shipments of photovoltaic module business, the shipment of energy storage products increased by nearly 300% year-on-year, and the operation and maintenance scale of distributed power stations increased by more than 80%.

We believe that since the development of the photovoltaic industry, the profit point of the industry has gradually shifted from the upstream manufacturing end to the downstream channel end, and Trina has the most comprehensive and complete system solution service capabilities in the industry, which can better understand customer needs, have stronger customer service capabilities, effectively improve customer energy service experience, and face a broader market space for value volume, so it has gained stronger bargaining power.

By the end of 2023, other businesses other than modules accounted for 35% of the company's revenue, becoming the company's second growth curve, and this proportion will continue to increase to more than 50% in the future.

The overall market value of overseas markets is higher, and TRW is one of the companies with the most complete overseas channel construction and global layout in the industry, ranking first in the U.S. market shipments in 2023 except for local U.S. companies.

In recent years, the company has successively set up global headquarters, international headquarters and overseas regional headquarters, established manufacturing bases around the world, introduced international high-level management and R&D talents from more than 70 countries, and has business in more than 170 countries around the world.

NBD: How do you see the future development trend of the energy storage market? What is Trina Solar's strategic layout in the field of energy storage? What is the significance of the integration of photovoltaic energy and storage to the power grid?

Gao Jifan: When I visited abroad, I found that the ratio of distribution and storage of some foreign power station projects has reached 1:4. We believe that the energy storage industry will usher in rapid development in the future, and the global energy storage market space is expected to reach 600GWh by 2029. Authoritative forecasts show that by 2035, the annual new global energy storage shipments will be 15 times that of 2022.

Energy storage products are an important part of the company's second growth curve, and Trina's energy storage shipments increased by nearly 300% in the first half of 2024, which has been continuously recognized by many global authoritative organizations including BNEF, DNV, S&P, SMM, etc., building a comprehensive leading optical storage solution capability from battery cells to cabins to AC side.

Trina Energy Storage has established three integration centers in China, Europe, and North America to achieve full-stack joint debugging. It has four R&D platforms, including Advanced Energy Storage Battery Research Institute, Advanced Energy Storage Product Research Institute, System Integration Engineering Center and Power Electronics Research Institute, to jointly build a complete R&D chain from basic scientific exploration to product application practice.

Trina Energy Storage has already achieved remarkable results in domestic and overseas markets, from Gansu to Qinghai, and from North America to Europe, and Trina's full-stack system security solutions have started global deliveries. Launched the first full-stack integrated 10MWh Elementa 2 Elevate energy storage solution from self-developed cells to AC side in the North American market. Successfully signed a contract with the 75MW/300MWh energy storage power station project on the power grid side of China Nuclear Huineng Crook, and took the lead in completing the electrochemical shared energy storage power station on the grid side to assist in the construction of an integrated photovoltaic and storage charging station and a zero-carbon park.

By the end of June 2024, Trina had shipped nearly 7GWh of energy storage cabins and systems. In the future, Trina will continue to deepen the safety and product innovation of energy storage technology, provide safer and more reliable energy storage system solutions for global customers, and contribute to the construction of a new national power system and the adjustment of energy structure.

NBD: Since May this year, Trina Solar has initiated patent lawsuits at home and abroad for many times, what is the current status of the company's patent "moat" construction? How does the company want intellectual property rights in the PV industry to develop?

Gao Jifan: Technological innovation is one of the effective ways to break the involution of the industry, and innovation needs to be respected and protected, which is the general trend of industry development. Trina Solar is committed to working with industry peers to promote the healthy development of the industry.

As a leading global leader in the photovoltaic field, Trina Solar has invested more than 23 billion yuan in R&D. Up to now, the company has applied for more than 5,600 patents and authorized more than 3,000 patents around the world, ranking in the leading position in the industry in terms of patent ownership. At the same time, the company was the first to mention IEC international standards, led and participated in the formulation of 220 industry standards, and issued 146 standards.

Among them, Trina Solar has more than 500 patents for TOPCon cells and modules, and the company has been conducting research on perovskite and crystalline silicon tandem cell technology since 2014, accumulating a large number of technological innovation achievements. So far, the company has undertaken 8 perovskite solar cell science and technology projects at or above the provincial level, such as the National Key R&D Program and the Jiangsu Provincial Key R&D Program; He has applied for 331 technical patents in the field of perovskite technology.

From the perspective of patent citations, Tianhe's patents have been cited more than 5 times and rank first in the industry, the number of patent applications ranks among the top in the world, and the number of invention patents owned ranks among the top in the industry. The Jiangsu Provincial Intellectual Property Office recently released the "Statistical Table of the Top 10 Patent Authorized Units of Enterprises in the Province in the First Half of the Year", and Trina Solar ranked sixth in the province with 230 authorized patents.

Trina Solar advocates collaborative innovation and builds an industry ecosystem. In 2024, the company will take the lead in preparing for the establishment of a new generation of photovoltaic technology and equipment manufacturing innovation center, unite upstream and downstream enterprises in the industrial chain, universities and other innovative entities to carry out collaborative innovation around the photovoltaic industry, and jointly lay out a new generation of photovoltaic products - crystalline silicon tandem solar cells, so as to contribute to building an innovation platform with global influence.

NBD: In the first half of the year, the U.S. Department of Commerce launched a "double reversal" investigation on PV products imported from four Southeast Asian countries. When is the company's production capacity in Indonesia and the U.S. expected to come into operation?

Gao Jifan: According to the results of the preliminary anti-subsidy ruling of the US Department of Commerce, the current tax rate of Tianhe's Thailand factory is 0.14%, which is the lowest among all responding enterprises, which fully reflects that Tianhe is a highly global and market-oriented enterprise. The current international trade situation for PV products is complex, but the company has prospectively invested in the construction of a 1GW cell and module plant in Indonesia, which is expected to be operational within the year. The company will also explore the international market in depth through localized cooperation and explore ways for Chinese enterprises to go overseas under the new situation. The precise global production capacity layout and global strategic evolution will further enhance the company's global customer service capabilities.

NBD: In the context of the trough of the PV industry, what are Trina Solar's considerations for continuing to increase the recruitment of R&D personnel and increase R&D investment? What is the company's vision for the future of photovoltaic technology?

Gao Jifan: In 2012, when the photovoltaic industry was facing difficulties, some people said to me that in this case, the R&D funds should be cut to ensure that they can survive the cold winter. But I responded that I can cut any expense, but I can't cut R&D expenses. Only by firmly grasping innovation and not relaxing, can we reap the joy of seeing all the mountains at a glance. We choose to work hard to strengthen technological innovation and R&D capabilities to build TRW's core competitiveness.

Facts have proved that Trina's choice is correct, the development of photovoltaic technology to this day, is far from reaching the end, TOPCon technology to replace PERC technology to become the mainstream technology of the photovoltaic industry took almost 5 years, in the next 5 years, TOPCon as the absolute mainstream technology will have an absolute efficiency increase of 1%~2%.

Photovoltaic technology is destined to enter the era of perovskite, and the photoelectric conversion rate of Trina perovskite tandem cell laboratory has reached more than 34%. Compared with HJT and IBC cells, TOPCon is more suitable as the bottom cell of crystalline silicon/perovskite tandem cells, and all of Trina's i-TOPCon production capacity can be upgraded to tandem cell production capacity, and in the future, Trina's TOPCon/perovskite tandem cells will lead the photovoltaic industry into the "30+ era" of photoelectric conversion rate (i.e., the conversion rate exceeds 30%).

NBD: In September this year, Trina Solar's Central Research Institute announced that it had successfully manufactured the world's first fully recycled PV module. What is the competitiveness of recycled components?

Gao Jifan: Module recycling is still in its infancy in China, and it needs to be continuously improved and improved in all aspects. From a technical point of view, the fully automated, low-cost dismantling and recycling of dismantling and recycling equipment and the realization of high-value recycling will be the focus of Trina Solar's subsequent technology development.

The company itself is a manufacturer of photovoltaic modules, and is very clear about the packaging structure of different types of photovoltaic modules, the properties and dosages of various materials used in the modules, so when we develop module recycling technology, the selection of direction and the design of the method are very clear, and our module recycling technology has a relatively high recycling rate of materials, lower cost and more environmentally friendly.

Various materials in the module, such as photovoltaic glass, its weight is the largest, accounting for about 70%, the production raw materials for the manufacture of photovoltaic glass are mainly quartz sand and soda ash, which are prepared through the process of batching and smelting, and the glass obtained through module recycling only needs to start from smelting.

For example, the recycled aluminum frame can also be melted and molded with only simple pretreatment; The processing of recycled silicon materials is relatively more complicated, because the recycled silicon materials are obtained from cells, which have a larger surface area than the bulk materials made by modified Siemens, and need to be cleaned by chemical methods. But overall, recycled materials cost less than new parts.

This time, the conversion efficiency of fully recycled recycled photovoltaic modules has reached 20.7%, and the power exceeds 645W, which is about 2% lower than the efficiency of our mass production. This is because 100% of the silicon in the cells used in the recycled PV modules comes from the silicon materials recycled from the modules. If it is combined with the modified Siemens block material, it is possible to improve the efficiency, and we are currently conducting research on this.

In addition, the lifespan of fully recycled PV modules needs to be tested over a long period of time, and we are currently testing this area.

For a long time, Trina Solar has adhered to the development of advanced technology routes for the recovery and recycling of waste photovoltaic modules, and has continuously led technological innovation and pursued excellence. The successful roll-off of the world's first fully recycled PV module is a vivid practice of Trina Solar's innovation to promote the development of new quality productivity, and it is also Trina Solar's responsibility to promote the circular economy and green development of the photovoltaic industry, contributing to the global energy transition and green development.

Cover image source: Courtesy of the company