While some lenders and financiers have signaled plans to stop funding polluting power stations, a new report shows that 33 global banks have poured $1.9 trillion into financing the fossil fuel industry as a whole since the adoption of the Paris Agreement. Big U.S. banks led by JPMorgan have invested most heavily.

Toyota Australia will transform its former manufacturing site in West Melbourne into a renewable energy hub to produce green hydrogen with the help of funding from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA). In other hydrogen-related news, researchers at UNSW Sydney with partners H2Store have received a $3.5 million investment from Providence Asset Group to develop a hydrogen residential storage.

A 30 kW vertical array has been powered up at Australia’s Casey research station in Antarctica. The project is one the largest solar installations on the ice-covered continent.

The Korean solar manufacturer has lodged a lawsuit with the Federal Court of Australia against Chinese panel makers Jinko and Longi following similar allegations in the U.S. and Germany.

The Chinese polysilicon heavyweight has joined forces with Japanese industrial and energy conglomerate Mitsui & Co and software company eVolution Networks, and promises to deliver a solution that will beef up the grid.

Motivated by steeply declining cost curves, leading utilities are building solar portfolios around the globe. The latest statistics show the cumulative capacity of the biggest utility-scale solar plant owners topped 18 GW at the end of last year, with power companies in China, the U.S. and India to the fore.

Western Australia’s state-owned utility Horizon Power is preparing to roll out 13 solar and battery technology units at 14 far-flung farms in the Esperance region.

The first sod has been turned on a massive solar+storage development located between Harlin and Kilcoy, in south-east Queensland. The project was proposed by Sunshine Energy Australia, a newcomer to the Aussie solar scene.

With the transition to an auction procurement mechanism under way, Japan is this year set to expand the range of projects subject to the tender system from 2 MW-plus to 500 kW and above. With certain FIT cuts for projects with more than 2 MW capacity set to take effect in the second half of the year, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry has now proposed reducing tariffs for 10-500 kW commercial PV systems.

With its feed-in tariff set to expire at the end of June, Vietnam is considering different levels of payment, classified across three irradiation regions and involving four solar technologies. Future payments would range from $0.0659-0.0985/kWh, with the cloudy north in line for the highest tariffs and with the government likely to revise tariffs for new projects every two years.