AUBURN HILLS, Mich. — The rows of rollers, gates and other assorted gizmos with esoteric names purr quietly in an eat-off-the-floor clean plant in this city about 30 miles north of Detroit.
Later this spring, the machine — it has no catchy name — will start producing nine-mile-long sheets of thin solar energy panels. Its inventor says the panels may bring cheaper, cleaner power to homes and businesses around the world.
The sheets use a technology called photovoltaics that sandwiches several gases, including hydrogen, between a layer of stainless steel and laminates.
Unlike conventional solar panels that use heavy, stiff glass, the photovoltaic sheets are thin, light and pliable. They can be used to replace normal roof shingles and generate electric power from the sun.
"You're looking at the present and the future," gushes Stan Ovshinsky, president and chief executive officer of Energy Conversion Devices Inc.
"Hydrogen has been called the ultimate fuel, and the sun is the ultimate source of energy. If you tap into that, and you should, it changes the world beyond anything anybody could expect."
Photovoltaics is not new, but Ovshinsky's device for mass producing the sheets is. The challenge, he says, has always been to invent a process for producing large quantities of the material at a reasonable cost without compromising quality.
"Nothing like this was ever considered possible," he exclaims as he shows off the massive machinery that stretches longer than a football field.
What made it all possible was Ovshinsky's invention of a "multi-junction" that allows the machinery to join six rolls of the material to create one roll, nine miles long and 16 inches wide, without any loss of generation capability at the seams.
Over the course of a year, Ovshinsky plans to produce 1,000 miles of the material, which can provide a total of 30 megawatts of electric power.
"If we can get up to 75 to 100 (megawatts), then we'll be competitive with the power companies," he said.
But an engineering professor familiar with the technology says photovoltaics, like any form of solar power, can be severely impacted by cloud cover and snowfall, limiting its use outside the sunbelt as a primary power source.
"It would be very good as a complement to another power source," said Brian Gilchrist, professor of engineering and space science at the University of Michigan.
Ovshinsky says electric power generated by the photovoltaic sheets costs about 7 cents per kilowatt hour.
That compares with 8.34 cents per kilowatt hour charged by DTE Energy Inc., according to company spokesman Scott Simons.
However, it would cost about $20,000 for enough photovoltaic material to provide sufficient power for the owner of an average-size home to declare independence from the power company, according to ECD spokesman Richard Thompson.
"How long is the payback period?" asked DTE's Simons.
The Detroit-based utility has small solar power generating facilities in Southfield and in Washtenaw County's Scio Township, near Ann Arbor. But customers who use power from those sources pay a premium of $6 a month per 100 kilowatts, according to Simons.
Those customers for the most part are sensitive to the environment and are willing to pay the premium, he said.
DTE Energy is focusing more on stationary fuel cell generators that can provide emergency or auxiliary power to homes and businesses.
The company holds a 32 percent interest in Plug Power, based in Latham, N.Y. That company is developing natural gas-powered fuel cell generators.
The theory behind both DTE Energy's plans to offer fuel cell generators and Ovshinsky's dream of photovoltaic-shingled homes and businesses is called "distributive energy," meaning power is generated where it will be used, not at a central plant.
Ovshinsky is not opposed to fuel cells; his firm develops those, too. But he believes his photovoltaic material and ability to mass produce it is the most cost-effective and efficient way to provide clean energy.