Steve Sechrist
Senior Analyst and Editor

Remember the old saying, "when the world gives you lemons–make lemonade?" A story in the Nikkei.net Interactive out of Japan brings this adage to mind. The headline is "Materials Makers Shift Focus from LCD Panels to Solar Cells." Could it be that all those dollars spent in making LCDs more competitive can now be leveraged in the production of low cost solar panels? Will this not only help reduce our carbon emissions, but improve our pocket book by reducing home energy costs?

The Nikkei story goes on to report that Asahi Glass is delaying the start of a new LCD glass substrate plant, while investing roughly $30M to install a solar cell glass processing facility in China. Another, LCD materials film maker Kuraray Co. cut LCD panel film production due to waning demand, but is investing in new sealing materials for solar cells.

It seems that the backplane structure of both LCD panels and solar cells used to convert sunlight into energy, are (basically) the same, meaning owners of large LCD fabrication plants can shift production from power hungry consumer electronic displays to an entirely different product, targeting a completely different ("Green") industry that’s booming.

Case in point, Insight Media’s Ken Werner reported at CES this year Sharp’s CEO Daisuke Koshima "…struck what is probably the most optimistic note possible in these difficult times. Production at Sharp’s Gen 10 plant is scheduled to begin in March 2010, and, although the company once focused on the plant’s ability to make very large panels economically, it is now talking about the plant’s flexibility." That is, to make efficient large LCD flat panel TVs, of various sizes, or move to component and solar cell production.

For years now, LCD makers have made huge investments successively larger generation fabs, to gain the economies of scale and lower the cost of LCD panels. But the investment, improving the technology and output yields has a wonderful residual benefit–the advent of low-cost solar panels.

What makes this story so compelling is not just the industrial shift, but the social impact of such a trend. Think of it, our sour economy (no pun intended) is opening up opportunities for consumers to move towards energy independence, cutting electric power bills, and to do it using the very same technology to generate energy, rather than consume it.

Credit the display industry for putting in place not only the fab lines, but the infrastructure, materials science and distribution mechanisms needed to begin to move our world economy away from a dependence on oil based energy.

These tough economic times may just wake people up to the necessity of "sustainability" but not just at the global level, we’re talking about "household sustainability" at the family level in a move toward getting off the consumption side of the energy grid. Put up enough solar panels (and given enough sunlight) and you may just see the energy meter running backwards, generating credits from the power company back to you.

As prices continue to drop and solar panel efficiencies rise, this technology becomes a real option for homeowners. So get out the juice squeezer and start making that lemonade.