Single-crystal silicon wafers are traditionally produced by wire-sawing silicon ingots. Sawing consumes expensive diamond-coated wire, requires costly chemicals for etching damaged wafers, and results in 40 percent of the silicon ingot being wasted as non-recyclable saw dust called “kerf.” This process is inherently expensive. And, after 70 years of refinement, there is limited opportunity for sawing method improvements. Leading Edge’s Floating Silicon Method™ produces silicon wafers in a single step and without sawing. Our silicon wafer manufacturing process drops into existing manufacturing lines and reduces wafer production costs by 50 percent over traditional methods.

Additionally, oxygen contamination in silicon wafers limits solar cell efficiency and is a natural and unavoidable side effect of traditional silicon ingot production. Leading Edge’s technology creates silicon ribbons with minimal levels of oxygen contamination. Silicon wafers produced with our drop-in technology boast a power increase of seven percent for existing solar panels.