Highlights

Germany set a new record in March as more than half of its power was generated from wind, PV and other renewables. In the first quarter, renewables accounted for 45.4% of net electricity generation, according to Energy Charts from Fraunhofer ISE.

The Japanese CIS solar module maker has been acquired — along with its parent company, Showa Shell Sekiyu — through a share exchange by Japanese oil refiner Idemitsu. The transaction was announced in mid-October, while the preliminary agreement was signed in July.

The Tunisian government awarded contracts for six 10 MW solar projects in the country’s second solar tender. The tender process was launched last August.

Approximately 420 MW of solar power was newly installed in February. The strong growth for the first two months of the year was mainly due to the FIT cuts for commercial PV projects.

A recent Australian National University study shows that newly developed geographic information system algorithms can identify prospective sites for off-river pumped hydro projects throughout the world. The researchers, who identified around 530,000 potential sites, said pumped-hydro installations could enable large-scale energy time-shifting, as well as a range of ancillary services such as frequency regulation, which could help to integrate high levels of PV and wind into electricity systems.

The Turkish solar market finds itself at a crossroads in 2019, with previous policy settings coming to an end and more questions than answers being raised by recent government efforts. While the YEKA projects to date have delivered little in terms of installations, Muren Guler from Global Energy Ltd believes that ‘Mini YEKA’ could provide just the boost manufacturers, suppliers, and developers are looking for.

The clouds gathering over Turkey’s 1 GW solar park in Konya, the first YEKA tender, are dominating discussion among the country’s PV players. Developments surrounding the Konya tender illustrate the Turkish solar market’s challenges, as the country’s unsteady economy and its policy preference for local manufacturing appear to be acting as a brake on installations.

With around 2,056 MW of operational installed capacity from large-scale PV and more than 500 MW of installed distributed-generation capacity, Brazil has now surpassed Chile to become Latin America’s second-largest solar market after Mexico. According to new statistics released by Brazilian industry association ABSOLAR, utility-scale solar currently accounts for around 1.2% of the country’s total generating capacity.

Macquarie has closed on funding for a third portion of a 340 MWh project in Southern California, and LADWP is planning 1.8 GW of batteries.