Solar and wind are being installed at a rate that is three times faster than all other new electricity sources combined. This offers compelling market-based evidence that PV and wind are now the most competitive and practical methods for deploying new generating capacity.

Airport PV can provide an instant boost to emission-reduction efforts while work continues on sustainable aviation fuels. Developing solar projects at or near airports, however, is not as straightforward as typical ground-mount installations.

The two dominant methods used in the industry to estimate soiling levels on solar projects go some way in mitigating losses, but there is plenty of scope for more accurate observation.

Buoyant predictions about a rosy future for African photovoltaics, based on the continent’s abundant solar resources, continue to overlook the difficulties of securing investment, as Empower New Energy co-founder and CEO Terje Osmundsen explains, referring to a report published by the Africa Solar Industry Association at the World Future Energy Summit in Abu Dhabi today.

Russia is destroying Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, raising questions about how to ensure the safety and function of the country’s energy industry, particularly its nuclear power plants. What role can renewable energy play in such extreme circumstances?

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.

A recent Wood Mackenzie report looks at trends and challenges in the burgeoning US solar market, including manufacturing stimulated by the US Inflation Reduction Act.

Researchers from Victoria’s Deakin University say they have successfully tested a new process that can safely and effectively extract silicon from end-of-life solar panels, and then convert it into nano materials worth more than $45,000 (USD 31,500) per kilogram, in order to build better batteries.

Chanda Nxumalo, the chairperson of the South African Photovoltaic Industry Association (SAPVIA), speaks with pv magazine about the prospects of the South African energy market, its new regulations and the bright future for the PV sector. Nxumalo also addresses the challenges and opportunities for battery storage, green hydrogen and women in renewables.

Energiasalv has secured a construction permit to build a 6 GWh pumped hydro storage plant in Paldiski. Work on the facility is planned to start in the summer of 2024.

Construction has started on a 93 MW solar project in the Australian state of Victoria. The installation, which has been under development for at least five years, was sold to Enel Green Power in 2019.

Turkey has released a hydrogen roadmap as part of its plans to meet its 2035 net-zero emission targets, hinging on solar energy and importing electrolysis technologies in the short term. Gulmira Rzayeva, research fellow at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, says this target is realistic.

Located in Spain’s southern province of Badajoz, the project is the largest PV facility built by Acciona in its home country.

French specialist Sun’Agri unveiled the agronomic results on a crop of eggplant grown in a greenhouse commissioned in the Lot-et-Garonne in September, 2020.

kWh Analytics has started offering protection against physical damages to solar arrays and other renewable energy assets, in partnership with Aspen Insurance.

Ncondezi Energy has secured land for a 300 MW solar-plus-storage project in Mozambique. It has also signed an agreement with India’s Synergy Consulting for support in securing debt financing.

Germany’s TÜV Rheinland said it will invest €22 million in the 5,000 m2 facility for testing photovoltaic modules as part of a massive lab.

Antora Energy says its new 2 MW factory will make thermophotovoltaic cells for thermal storage applications. The cells are based on III-V semiconductors and reportedly have a heat-to-electricity conversion efficiency of more than 40%.

Italian researchers have analyzed different ways to assess the levelized cost of energy (LCoE) of perovskite solar cells and modules. They said a common approach should soon be defined to increase the market maturity of the tech.

The potential of perovskite solar cells and modules is still held back by issues such as stability and efficiency losses when scaling up from cell to module. But Annalisa Bruno, a scientist at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University, says most of these challenges could be overcome in the near future, with this technology extending from building-integrated PV to conventional solar projects.

Two of Australia’s richest people are expected to be rivals in the bidding process for Sun Cable, the developer of what could be the world’s biggest intercontinental solar and energy storage project. Administrators indicate that the sale process could be completed within three months.

Egyptian researchers have used paraffin wax as a phase-change material (PCM) to reduce the operating temperatures of PV modules. They have found that the material improves power yield by more than 15%, compared to a reference module without cooling.

Researchers and project developers throughout the world are increasingly looking at agrivoltaic installations with vertically oriented solar panels.

Qatari researchers have looked at the degree to which cleaning robots could threaten the physical integrity of solar panels. They found that cleaning machines have a very minimal impact and that modules of similar sizes tend to exhibit roughly the same amount of vibration.

Chinese researchers have developed a new passivation technique for shingled solar panels based on tunnel oxide passivated contacts (TOPCon) or heterojunction (HJT) tech. It reduces recombination losses in the cell-to-module process and reportedly increases open-circuit voltage, fill factor, and efficiency.

Hanwha Q Cells has launched the latest generation of its Q.MAXX solar panel series for the Australian residential market. It says the power class has been increased by up to 15 Wp from previous iterations.

Scientists in Austria have developed a long-term energy storage system that uses regenerative braking to adjust the descent speed of sand in mine shafts and generate electricity.

US-based Salgenx has developed a scalable redox flow battery with two separate tanks of electrolytes, one of which is saltwater. Unlike other flow batteries, the new device is membrane-free, promising big gains at the levelized cost of storage level.

The World Future Energy Summit showed that Middle Eastern solar markets are still driven by utility-scale PV, although the C&I sector shows signs of growth. Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates are the most promising markets for big solar projects, with huge pipelines under development, while Lebanon and Yemen show promise due to chronic energy shortages.

The South African government has provided figures on “embedded generation projects” that are currently under development in the country. It also revealed that it will soon launch a tender for big storage projects.

About 27 GW of solar and storage projects remain in New York’s interconnection queue. The grid operator has also advanced 3 GW of wind projects and a 1.25 GW transmission line.