Developer Anumar has secured the signature of Norwegian renewables company Statkraft on a 50 MW power purchase agreement for the project and another 30 MW of generation capacity has been awarded a feed-in premium tariff in a tender. Umweltbank provided a €55 million loan.

The German authorities have issued 14 search warrants in Bavaria, Baden-Württemberg, Schleswig-Holstein, and Berlin. The probe is related to imports of 480,000 solar panels in 2014 and 2015, when the European Union had anti-dumping and anti-subsidy duties on Chinese solar products.

The German companies are developing an intelligent energy solution for heating, hot water, energy management and solar power generation in a single coordinated system.

The first Horizon folding rooftop has been installed above a parking lot in Switzerland, where it will generate power for on-site consumption, including EV charging.

The extraordinary measure of not publishing the results of successful project bids – brought in during the Covid-19 crisis – is set to be lifted from September, when the projects allocated in procurement rounds over the last five months will be made public.

Finnish company ICS has developed a foil which it claims can significantly increase the yield of solar panels, when applied to the edges of a PV module. Germany’s Fraunhofer ISE has confirmed that the increase in performance for conventional solar modules with the solar film is ranging from 5% to 10%.

State-owned power company China Three Gorges is reportedly ready to offer up to €600 million for 13 solar assets owned by X-Elio in Spain while Germany’s ib vogt is up for sale, according to Reuters.

Tesla boss Elon Musk has published the first image of the planned Gigafactory in Grünheide, near Berlin, in eastern Germany.

The volume of solar electricity generated and proportion of self-consumption at the Lake Maiwald floating plant have both surpassed expectations. Gravel company Ossola has been able to reduce its electricity bill 10% as a result.

The German meteorological service, the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and solar forecaster Meteocontrol are investigating how weather events can be better factored in when forecasting solar power generation. The Federal Ministry of Economics is funding the ‘Permastrom’ research project with €2.5 million.