While solar modules and inverters can greatly influence the output of a planned solar project, it is important not to overlook how to select and design cabling systems for your solar plant – for safety as well as generation considerations. Ye Qilin, a senior system engineer at Huawei’s FusionSolar smart PV and energy storage business, runs us through some dos and don’ts.

Following a disappointing COP27 climate change summit in November, solar industry veteran Philip Wolfe reviews the contribution utility-scale PV is starting to make to emissions reduction.

Ambitious targets for solar energy generation present challenges to an industry keen to explore new avenues for solar production. Neil Spann, chief executive of UK thin film solar manufacturer Power Roll, describes a commercial solution to the problems of over reliance on silicon solar modules.

Three import deals signed by the EU at Sharm El Sheikh during this month’s COP27 summit show the European Union is serious about harnessing green hydrogen for its heavy industry, and about distributing the fruits of the energy transition on an equitable basis.

The PV sector has significant implications for the economy, society and the environment. Positive impacts show that PV is a key contributor on the path to sustainability, and that highlighting these benefits could raise social and political acceptance in the transition to sustainable energy.

The off-grid solar sector has shown resilience in the face of pandemic-related challenges, with 70 million people gaining access to electricity from early 2020 to the end of 2021. However, the ability to pay for solar energy kits has taken a hit.

The African Development Bank has announced that European and US donors will provide $20 million of concessional loans to support pay-as-you-go solar companies in sub-Saharan Africa.

The International Renewable Energy Agency’s latest annual report on the progress towards UN sustainable development goal seven estimates 670 million people will still lack electricity in 2030, and more than 2 billion will be reliant on unhealthy, polluting cooking methods.

It should come as no surprise that clean energy spending is a big chunk of Warsaw’s four-year EU grant and loans package, given that the nation’s grid-connected solar capacity rose from 3.99 GW at the end of 2020 to 6.3 GW four months ago, according to the International Renewable Energy Agency.

The clean power numbers published annually by the International Renewable Energy Agency provide a snapshot of the global solar market and, this year, a lot of figures were unchanged from the previous dataset, especially in the off-grid segment.

Squad Mobility will start selling its new two-passenger Squad solar electric vehicle in the US market in January. It is designed for quick trips like grocery shopping or short-distance commutes.

The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) has urged the Australian government to develop a domestic solar manufacturing industry. A new report warns that the high concentration of global silicon and PV cell supply chains pose real risks to the national energy security.

The US energy storage market hit an inflection point in 2020. The Energy Information Administration expects the deployment of grid-scale storage to pick up over the next three years.

SolarPower Europe’s latest analysis reveals that 9.3 GWh of battery energy storage systems have been installed in more than 1 million European households this year.

The German parliament has approved a new package of tax breaks for rooftop PV, including a value-added tax exemption for PV systems up to 30 kW in size.

Norwegian researchers have published a new study showing that the space between solar panels and rooftop surfaces might play a critical role in contributing to PV system fires.

A Chinese-Australian research group has created a new sodium-sulfur battery that purportedly provides four times the energy capacity of lithium-ion batteries. They say it is far cheaper to produce and offers the potential to dramatically reduce energy storage costs.

Vins Raïmat has built a 30 kW vertical solar installation as part of a 300 kW PV system at its winery in the Catalonian town of Raïmat, Spain. It protects the wine tubs from the sun while also reducing their energy consumption.

China’s Trina Solar has developed an upgraded version of its Vertex S All Black PV module, with about 30 W of additional output. It is offering the new product on the Australian market.

Indian developer Adani Green has commissioned a 450 MW wind-solar power plant in the Indian state of Rajasthan. It has reached 1.44 GW of cumulative hybrid power generation capacity.

Chinese scientists have used daminozide as an interlayer and additive to make a perovskite solar cell with a p-i-n structure. It has the highest efficiency and highest fill factor for a polycrystalline, MAPbI 3-based inverted perovskite solar cell to date.

Iranian researchers have looked at how ultrasonic thermoelectric generators could be used to lower the operating temperature of solar modules. Their new system can generate cold steam via ultrasonic piezoelectrics in a simple batch system.

Analysts have studied lab-to-market pathways for clean energy technologies, including First Solar’s cadmium-telluride thin-film solar modules.

Danish researchers have built a selenium solar cell with the highest open-circuit voltage ever reported. They said that with further improvements in the optoelectronic quality of selenium, the device could reach an efficiency of up to 8%.

Suomen Energiavarasto Oy has secured €26.3 million ($27.5 million) from the Finnish government to build an underground pumped hydro project at a former zinc and copper mine.

Linyang Energy has revealed plans to build a new solar factory in Jiangsu province, while Daqo has said it will build a new silicon production base in Inner Mongolia.

SEI Logistics has developed a portable, folding solar panel kit with batteries. The system is designed to work in harsh, remote environments.

Researchers in the Netherlands have designed a water-splitting system with an electrochemical cell and a 25%-efficient tandem perovskite-silicon solar cell. It can reportedly achieve a solar-to-hydrogen efficiency rating of more than 21%.

Canadian researchers have developed a new model to improve the performance of building-integrated PV (BIPV) shades in buildings. They considered solar electricity, heat transferred through windows, and interior daylighting quality.

A UK research group has proposed the combination of solar-powered heat pumps and thermal storage based on phase-change materials for residential applications. They said such a system could facilitate cost savings of up to 39%.

The International Energy Agency says that it expects the use of renewables to support global hydrogen production to surge over the next five years. The Netherlands and Denmark, meanwhile, have revealed plans to expand electrolysis capacity.

Pacific Northwest National Lab (PNNL) researchers have developed a new framework to compensate energy storage as a dual-use asset.

The Australian PV Institute (APVI) and the University of New South Wales (UNSW) have launched a free version of SunSPOT, a tool for tailored guidance on ideal solar and battery setups.

Scientists at the Dutch Institute for Fundamental Energy Research (DIFFER) have set up a database of 31,618 molecules that could potentially be used in future redox flow batteries. They used artificial intelligence and supercomputers to identify the properties of the molecules.

Panasonic claims that its new vehicle-to-home system can increase the self-consumption rate of residential solar and storage capacity to 90%.