Installations

The Saudi Electricity Company has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Public Investment Fund and Softbank Vision Fund to create 3 GW of solar and storage capacity in the Kingdom in 2018.

The Indian solar market is presently undergoing many challenges, including the GST effects, high module process and decelerating power demand. India’s utility sector is expected to stabilize at a much lower 5-6 GW growth rate per annum for the next two-three years, says Bridge to India.

At the recent PV Taiwan event, pv magazine caught up with Lu Zhao, head of PV System Technology Group at the Solar Energy Research Institute of Singapore (SERIS) to discuss the current potential of floating PV applications, and examine how hydropower coupled with floating solar could become a world-leading energy sector.

The tender process was launched by Ethiopian power utility EPP in May 2016. The solar plant will be built in Metehara, around 200 km east of Addis Ababa.

The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) forecasts as much as 90 GW of new solar additions annually across the globe over the next few years, driving a 60% reduction in costs.

In addition to ten project proposals for solar parks not exceeding 2 MW, the Albanian Ministry of Energy and Industry has also accepted an application for a 5 MW PV facility.

The Brazilian bank has agreed to finance three PV projects totaling 350 MW of the Italian energy giant Enel, and a 132 MW project under development by Norwegian companies Scatec Solar and a Statoil.

The tender, where capacity may even reach 500 MW, is part of the Oman government’s plan to diversify the country’s energy mix.

GIC Private Ltd., Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund, has said that one of its affiliates will become a corporate partner in GS Renewable Holdings GK, the parent of developer Japan Renewable Energy (JRE).

PV will compete with 3.8 GW of wind and a few hundreds of megawatts of less established renewable energy sources.