In its first monthly column for pv magazine, the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) explains how a team of its experts is currently working on the definition of new standards for VIPV systems.

Tariffs on solar glass harm the European solar industry. This problem can now be easily solved without jeopardizing the European solar glass production.

In another article of a series, Women in Solar Europe (WiSEu) gives voice to Claire Gardner, Marketing Manager Europe at Chinese inverter manufacturer Solis. She tells how she had to deal with her own insecurities rather than with a women-hostile environment at the beginning of her career in the renewable energy industry.

In a new weekly update for pv magazine, Solcast, a DNV company, reports that warm sea surface temperatures and disturbances increased onshore moisture along China’s southern coast, which in turn increased solar irradiance by 5-15% on long term averages.

In a new weekly update for pv magazine, OPIS, a Dow Jones company, offers bite-sized analysis on solar PV module supply and price trends.

Luxembourg-based Ardagh Group is installing solar PV at several of its packaging manufacturing sites in the United Kingdom and Europe. The latest is a 1.75 MW rooftop system installed at a glass packaging facility in Irvine, Scotland.

Sinovoltaics analyzed publicly traded inverter producers using a balance sheet-based model and publicly available financial information to track finacial strength over the past three years. The top-five in the latest ranking are Hoymiles Power Electronics, Enphase, Kstar, Eaton, and Goodwe.

Developed by the scientists at the Toronto Metropolitan University, the hybrid full cell system promises to achieve a levelized cost of energy ranging from

The Aswan High Dam Reservoir is one of the world’s largest water reservoir and suffers from high water evaporation rates due to the region’s very hot and dry climate. Floating PV installations may be a remedy, while also offering a good match for hydropower generation.

Scientists led by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have designed a new PV-powered desalination system based on the time-variant electrodialysis reversal (EDR) technology. The proposed system reportedly achieves lower levelized cost of water than conventional solar-powered desalination techs.

The Middle East Solar Industry Association’s (MESIA) latest Solar Outlook Report says that despite rapid growth in solar deployment across the Middle East and North Africa, the area’s power mix is still dominated by fossil fuels. It says growth will be led by utility-scale solar, but it calls for a balanced approach involving distributed energy projects.

Cordier, a winery in Bordeaux, France, is building solar carports at two of its facilities in southern France. The two PV arrays will be tied to 20 EV charging stations.

China’s Enerack says its new mounting legs are designed for 10-degree or 15-degree tilt angles. They are made of AL6005-T5 aluminum alloy and ethylene propylene diene monomer (EPDM), with a 304 stainless steel clamp.

Investment totaling €315.35 million ($337.8 million), consisting of funds from Eurobank and the Recovery and Resilience Fund Greece 2.0, will allow UK developer Lightsource bp to begin developing a 560 MW solar project located in the east of mainland Greece.

An international research team has developed a new type of perovskite solar cell by using 4-phenyl thiosemicarbazide (4PTSC) as a precursor additive. The device showed an improved open-circuit voltage and “exceptional” long-term stability.

A team from Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems has reduced silver consumption in the fabrication of PERC solar cells by screen-printing ultra-fine metallization lines measuring just 14 μm. The resulting solar cell offered remarkable efficiency levels, which were confirmed by Fraunhofer ISE CalLab.

A group of scientists from the Germany’s Fraunhofer ISE has proposed a new metric to assess the performance of shingled solar panels. They also applied the so-called passivated edge technology (PET) to experimental shingled modules and found it can increase their pseudo fill factor without compromising their inteconnection quality.

Swedish thin film solar manufacturer Midsummer has selected a factory in southeastern Sweden to develop its new solar module production facility, which will produce copper indium gallium selenide (CIGS) solar cells for the European market.

Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. (CATL) has shown its latest lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery at an auto show in Beijing. The Chinese company says it has an energy density of 205 Wh per kg, almost 8% higher than the current state of the art for such batteries.

Bluebird Solar, a PV module manufacturer in India, recently unveiled its 600 Wp tunnel oxide passivated contact (TOPCon) dual-glass bifacial solar panels. They offer a power conversion efficiency of 23.25%.

Researchers at the University of New South Wales claim to have identified three TOPCon panel failure types that are absent in PERC products. They explained that these failures may occur when the modules are exposed to high humidity and contaminants before encapsulation.

Chinese module maker JinkoSolar says a fire broke out at its integrated module manufacturing facility in Taiyuan, China’s Shanxi province. It says the incident could affect its 2024 annual results.

Chinese inverter manufacturer Sungrow shipped 130 GW of inverters last year, reaching a profit of $1.3 billion.

An Australian research group has used an SMA inverter to switch the operating point of a PV array and has demonstrated its ability to create photoluminescence images for both rooftop and large scale solar installations.

Sales of electric three-wheelers (e-3W) in India surpassed 580,000 units in 2023, compared to 320,000 vehicles sold in China, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).

As the Australian authorities launch rolling tenders for 32 GW of renewables and storage by 2030, it has become clear that some communities, including locals around pv magazine reporter Bella Peacock’s hometown, have not been brought onside. Heated debate on social media and a frenzy stoked by concerns about the impact on the natural environment are throwing up hurdles for renewables development.

Aurora Energy Research says it has recorded a sharp increase in green hydrogen projects, with 90% of them in early phases of development, while E.ON says that Germany’s hydrogen ramp-up is stuck due to an investment backlog.

The France-based group said its has released two new BESSs with enclosures of 7ft and 20ft. Their power ranges from 60 kW to 500 kW.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has issued its first report on the importance of battery energy storage technology in the energy transition. It has found that tripling renewable energy capacity by 2030 would require 1,500 GW of battery storage.