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Tellurium Reference Rate — 10-Day Trend
All prices in ₹ per gram · daily rate, updated once per day
One Company, an Outsized Share of Global Demand
It's rare that a single manufacturer's growth plans genuinely move a whole element's supply-demand balance, but First Solar comes close. Its cadmium telluride (CdTe) thin-film solar panels held an estimated 59% of the thin-film solar market in 2024, and CdTe panels are reported to cover more than 30% of the US utility-scale solar market. Today's tellurium reference rate is ₹10.43 per gram on September 17, 2026 — the commodity First Solar's entire panel business depends on.
- First Solar's technology: cadmium telluride (CdTe) thin-film solar cells
- Thin-film market share: roughly 59% held by CdTe in 2024
- US utility-scale solar: CdTe holds more than 30% of this segment
Tellurium Reference Rate by Weight
Today's Tellurium rate is Ten Rupees per gram. At this rate, 10 grams of Tellurium costs One Hundred and Four Rupees.
| Unit | Weight | Price (INR) | Price in Words |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 Gram | 1.0000 g | ₹10.43 | Ten Rupees |
| 8 Grams | 8.0000 g | ₹83.42 | Eighty Three Rupees |
| 10 Grams | 10.0000 g | ₹104.27 | One Hundred and Four Rupees |
| 100 Grams | 100.0000 g | ₹1,042.71 | One Thousand Forty Three Rupees |
| 1 Kilogram | 1,000.0000 g | ₹10,427.07 | Ten Thousand Four Hundred and Twenty Seven Rupees |
| 1 Ounce (oz) | 28.3495 g | ₹295.60 | Two Hundred and Ninety Six Rupees |
| 1 Troy Ounce | 31.1035 g | ₹324.32 | Three Hundred and Twenty Four Rupees |
| 1 Metric Ton | 1,000,000.0000 g | ₹10,427,067.00 | One Crore Four Lakh Twenty Seven Thousand Sixty Seven Rupees |
Growth Running Into a Genuine Physical Limit
First Solar doesn't mine or produce tellurium — it buys refined tellurium and manufactures panels, which puts the company's growth ambitions directly at the mercy of an element that makes up an almost immeasurably small fraction of the Earth's crust. By multiple industry accounts, First Solar's continued gigawatt-scale expansion has run into real supply constraints tied specifically to tellurium scarcity, not to manufacturing capacity or panel demand.
Why this isn't a problem First Solar can simply engineer around
Tellurium is recovered exclusively as a byproduct of copper anode-slime processing — there's no tellurium mine to expand, no dedicated deposit to develop faster. First Solar's raw-material availability is genuinely tied to decisions made in the copper-refining industry, an industry with its own economics that have nothing to do with solar panel demand.
| Metric | Figure |
|---|---|
| CdTe share of thin-film solar market (2024) | ~59% |
| CdTe share of US utility-scale solar | More than 30% |
| Leading CdTe manufacturer | First Solar |
Tellurium Reference Rate — Last 10 Days
The most recent Tellurium price on record (2026-09-17) is Ten Rupees per gram. This is up by Less than One Rupees from the previous day's rate of ₹10.39.
| Date | Price (INR/g) | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2026-09-17 | ₹10.43 | +0.03 |
| 2026-09-16 | ₹10.39 | +0.00 |
| 2026-09-15 | ₹10.39 | +0.01 |
| 2026-09-14 | ₹10.37 | +0.02 |
| 2026-09-13 | ₹10.36 | +0.00 |
| 2026-09-12 | ₹10.36 | +0.01 |
| 2026-09-11 | ₹10.35 | -0.01 |
| 2026-09-10 | ₹10.36 | +0.05 |
| 2026-09-09 | ₹10.31 | +0.04 |
| 2026-09-08 | ₹10.27 | — |
What This Concentration Means for Tellurium's Price Story
When one company's manufacturing plans represent such a large share of an element's total demand, that company's own expansion timeline becomes one of the most important things to watch for anyone following the underlying commodity — a dynamic that's genuinely unusual among the metals this site tracks, most of which have far more diffuse demand across many buyers.
The comparison table and 10-day history above track tellurium's own price trend. For a longer view, the site's own tellurium price history page holds real recorded data by year and month.
First Solar and Tellurium — Common Questions
First Solar is the leading manufacturer of cadmium telluride (CdTe) thin-film solar panels, a real, established alternative to the far more common silicon-based panels. CdTe held 59% of the thin-film solar market in 2024 by most industry estimates, with First Solar anchoring that share through gigawatt-scale manufacturing.
Cadmium telluride panels are reported to hold more than 30% of the US utility-scale solar market — a meaningful share for a thin-film technology competing against dominant silicon-based panels.
Yes, by multiple industry accounts — First Solar's continued manufacturing expansion has run into real constraints tied to tellurium's scarcity, since the element makes up an extremely small fraction of the Earth's crust and is only recovered as a byproduct of copper refining.
First Solar is a panel manufacturer, not a tellurium producer — it sources tellurium from refiners who recover it from copper anode slimes. Its business is directly exposed to tellurium availability and price without controlling the upstream supply itself.
Today's reference rate of ₹10.43 per gram reflects the broader tellurium market, of which First Solar's CdTe demand is the largest single component — the two are closely linked without moving in perfect lockstep, since other buyers and copper-refining supply also factor in.
