This week, Women in Solar Europe (WiSEu Network) takes a significant step by shedding light on health and safety issues for women in the solar and energy storage industry, a crucial topic that gained even more relevance after the observance of World Day for Safety and Health at Work on April 28th.

In a new weekly update for pv magazine, Solcast, a DNV company, reports that April’s weather in Europe presented a north-south divide impacting solar generation across the continent. High pressure systems over the Mediterranean meant sunnier than normal conditions in Southern Europe, benefitting PV output.

In a new weekly update for pv magazine, OPIS, a Dow Jones company, provides a quick look at the main price trends in the global PV industry.

If solar-powered irrigation pumps can be rolled out in a responsible manner at scale, the impact on agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa could be transformational.

As the world becomes increasingly roiled by extreme weather, drone-based electroluminescence (EL) mapping can be a key weapon in the arsenal of solar investors.

Australian energy giant Origin Energy has revealed plans to build what could be the biggest battery energy storage system (BESS) in the state of Queensland, as it continues the expansion of its renewable energy generation and storage portfolio.

Atess Power has developed a new series of battery energy storage system (BESS) containers. The Chinese manufacturer is offering 20 HC and 40 HC containers, as well as battery-only containers with storage capacities up to 3,440 kWh.

A Chinese-Canadian research team proposed a new PV mounting solution relying on two types of spacers and two types of clamps that can be printed with common printing materials. The cost of the different solutions presented varies from CAD1.50 ($1.10) to CAD3.83.

Praveer Sinha, CEO and managing director of Tata Power says the company’s 4 GW solar cell factory in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu will be commissioned from next month. It will reach peak production capacity of 4 GW over a period of three months.

China Southern Power Grid has deployed a 10 MWh sodium-ion battery in China’s Guangxi Zhuang region. It is the first phase of a 100 MWh project.

UNSW scientists have suggested to use dual-fuel reciprocating engines for adding gas-to-power operations in large scale production of hydrogen based on PV power. The preliminary findings of their research show that the proposed system is still achieving a too high LCOE for commercial maturity. Decreasing electrolyzer costs, policy interventions and changing energy market dynamics, however, may more than halve the LCOE values in the future.

Eight of the 10 transmission corridors proposed by the US Department of Energy (DoE) could facilitate transmission between grid regions. One would expand transmission within the Mid-Atlantic’s PJM grid region, and one would expand transmission in the Northern Plains.

The Chinese manufacturer said the new product has an efficiency of up to 19.46% and a temperature coefficient of -0.30% per C. It is available in bright red, light gray, brown, green, blue-green, orange, and ocean blue.

Japan’s Asahi Kasei is testing a new alkaline water electrolyzer, while China has started developing its first 100 kg vehicle-mounted liquid hydrogen system.

The Selfmade Energy online platform says that prices for PV systems and battery storage systems fell by more than 4% between November 2023 and March 2024. In March, for example, 6 kW PV systems without batteries were sold for between €1.66 ($1.79)/W and €2.10/W.

The Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), the US Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), and German battery analysis specialist Twaice have jointly evaluated 26 battery fires between 2018 and 2023. They say that the diversity of components plays a critical role in igniting fires.

Scientists in China have demonstrated a photovoltaic-thermal system that utilizes Tesla valves to increase cooling and efficiency. The system was found to have better performance compared to PVT systems made with several different cross-sectional structures.

A startup spun out of the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) has secured a grant to build a 5 kW electrolyzer that will be deployed at a UK power plant operated by French energy utility EDF.

An international research team developed a perovskite solar cell performance-boosting treatment based on phenethyl ammonium chloride (PEACl) that is also claimed to reduce the number of process steps. With this technique, the group built a champion device with a 20.9% efficiency.

Development of green hydrogen production in Europe is moving forward in fits and starts, but the ongoing World Hydrogen 2024 event in Rotterdam calls for blue hydrogen adoption, which suggests that the oil and gas industry aims to maintain control of the hydrogen market. 

SEG Solar has secured a land-use agreement for a solar-focused manufacturing site in an industrial zone on the Indonesian island of Java. The $500 million plan will involve the production of 5 GW of silicon wafers, 5 GW of solar cells, and 5 GW of PV modules.

The latest supply chain report from the Hong Kong-based technical compliance and quality assurance company covers India, providing information about current and planned capacity at 116 manufacturing plants.

Carbon, a French PV module maker, says its new €1.7 billion ($1.8 billion) manufacturing facility will initially produce TOPCon products.

Tongwei has agreed to provide more than 862,400 tons of polysilicon to Longi from 2024 to 2026.

Grew Energy has started building a 3.2 GW ingot-module factory in India. The facility will produce 2.8 GW of ingots, wafers, and cells per year, along with 3.2 GW of high-efficiency PV modules.

The Austrian manufacturer said its new heat pump can achieve a seasonal coefficient of performance of up to 4.7 and flow temperatures of up to 75 C. It is available with sizes ranging from 2 kW to 7 kW.

Scientists have investigated different techno-economic scenarios for using hydrogen storage in combination with hydropower and pumped hydro storage in Switzerland. They have found that hydrogen storage plays no major role under most conditions.

Renew Home, a partnership between Google Nest Renew and OhmConnect, aims to expand from 3 GW of electrical energy use to 50 GW by 2030.

AGL Energy has completed the installation of a solar-powered microgrid with a 5.4 MWh battery energy storage system in Australia to support the transition of a commercial orchard’s operations from diesel to renewables.

Midea says its new outdoor residential Evox G3 Heat Pump ranges in size from 1.5 tons to 5 tons, with a coefficient of performance of 1.8. It features enhanced vapor injection technology and uses A2L as the refrigerant.