Commercial & Industrial PV

BlackRock has agreed to acquire SolarZero, a New Zealand rooftop PV specialist, as part of its push into renewable energy in the Asia-Pacific region.

The French authorities have allocated 89.8 MW of solar capacity in the country’s latest procurement exercise for commercial and industrial PV systems.

Italy’s cumulative PV capacity surpassed 23 GW at the end of June. Rooftop PV continues to drive the Italian solar market, but the large-scale segment is finally showing the first signs of a real recovery.

Swedish researchers have developed a model to analyze the microclimate parameters of a vertically mounted agrivoltaic system. They validated their model by comparing its estimations with measurements of solar irradiance, PV module temperature, and ground temperature.

SolarBotanic Trees will begin offering its solar trees in early 2023. The systems will use monocrystalline cells with an efficiency of up to 24%, encapsulated in a 3D shape.

Spain’s Desigenia has developed a hybrid system that makes it possible to replace diesel generators with solar energy, battery storage, and hydrogen fuel cells.

US manufacturer Yotta Energy said that its two new microinverters are compatible with up to four high-power PV modules. They have a peak efficiency of 96.5% and a nominal maximum power point tracking (MPPT) efficiency of 99.5%.

In June 2020, German developer BayWa r.e. inaugurated its largest agrivoltaic power plant in the Netherlands, with a capacity of 2.7 MW. pv magazine France looks at the economic model.

US researchers are exploring the potential to co-locate solar with cattle or sheep, crops, pollinator-friendly native plants, soil rehabilitation, and other ecosystem services.

Japan’s latest procurement exercise was open to PV projects above 250 kW in size. The lowest price came in at JPY 9.7 ($0.066)/kWh and the allocated capacity was just 26.2 MW, out of 225 MW tendered.