Residential PV

Electricity regulator ANEEL has proposed applying a fee for solar systems with up to 5 MW of generation capacity and reducing energy payments for participants in the nation’s net metering program.

The Smart Energy Hub can operate in electrolysis mode to store renewable energy as hydrogen, or in fuel cell mode to produce electricity and heat from previously produced hydrogen or methane. Its developers are the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission and start-up Sylfen.

The Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency expects the nation’s solar generation capacity to have increased by another 5 GW by the end of next year, from around 4.4 GW at the end of 2018. By the end of 2023, installed PV capacity is predicted to reach approximately 15 GW.

The EU member state added 418 MW of new solar in the first six months of the year and its energy regulator expects another 1.4 GW in the years ahead, as a result of the METAR incentives scheme introduced in 2017. The regulator has also announced a pilot renewables auction with the results expected early next year.

The Institute for Essential Services Reform (IESR), an Indonesian think tank, has reported that the country has the potential to install up to 655 GW of rooftop PV capacity. Contrast that with a current installed capacity of just 100 MW, and it’s clear that solar PV still has a long way to go before it reaches its potential throughout Indonesia. Given the poor air quality in many heavily populated cities across the archipelago, PV deployment is long overdue in the Southeast Asian nation.

In September, PV systems with a total generation capacity of 287 MW were registered in the country. The feed-in tariff has fallen again for this quarter as a result of the new capacity additions.

Analysts at Fitch Solutions have published a report singling out Spain and Brazil as ‘outperformers’ in the global solar market and labelled Vietnam the “market to watch”. The analysts expect surging growth from the Southeast Asian nation to continue in the coming decade.

Industry body Gogla and the World Bank’s Lighting Global program said the last six months set a record for off-grid solar deployment. Solar home systems and other small off-grid appliances are being used in ever larger numbers.

The government has amended two regulations and introduced a new one to spur development of rooftop PV. The new provisions increase the size of systems eligible for net metering payments and reduce fees for industrial installations.

A study from Sweden seeks to consider how PV could be sympathetically installed on historic buildings. The researchers propose a target-based approach for assessing panel visibility.