3D solar tower increases capacity factor 50%, triples solar surface area
Janta Power closed $5.5 million in seed funding to develop its vertical solar tower, with pilot programs already underway in major global airports like Dallas-Fort Worth and Munich International Airport.
Chinese PV Industry Brief: Energy China, PowerChina win Saudi EPC deals
Energy China and PowerChina have secured $4.3 billion of engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) contracts for gigawatt-scale wind and solar projects in Saudi Arabia.
‘Solar modules could be produced in Europe at €0.15/W’
At the Modules and Material Worksop in Konstanz, organized by solar manufacturing engineering company RCT Solutions and ICS Konstanz, experts from the European PV equipment production industry gathered to discuss the current and future trajectory of manufacturing costs, technology advancements and equipment and raw material capabilities. RCT Solutions CEO, Peter Fath, told pv magazine that a European 1 GW module assembly facility using the same supply chain as Chinese Tier 1 counterparts could reach module manufacturing costs of €0.11-0.12/W.
China module prices climb 1.14%, industry awaits polysilicon consolidation plan
In a new weekly update for pv magazine, OPIS, a Dow Jones company, provides a quick look at the main price trends in the global PV industry.
Opes Solar Mobility starts VIPV module production
Opes Solar Mobility has opened a 12,000-square-meter facility near Leipzig, Germany, to produce flexible photovoltaic modules for commercial and recreational vehicles, supplying partners across Europe, Africa, and South America.
Textile integrated organic solar PV canopy provides shade, area lighting
A novel technical textile integrating 150 organic photovoltaic solar PV devices was demonstrated in a pavilion installation at the Dutch Design Week 2025 in Eindhoven, Netherlands this month.
SoftBank fine-tunes PV-battery tech for high altitudes
Japan’s SoftBank Corp. has launched a four-year program backed by the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) to advance high-density batteries and high-efficiency solar cells for high-altitude platform station aircraft.
Asian solar companies meet France’s carbon rules for reduced residential VAT
Chinese manufacturers such as JinkoSolar and DMEGC Solar have launched low-carbon PV modules that comply with France’s 530 kgCO₂eq/kWp threshold for residential systems eligible for a 5.5% value-added tax (VAT) rate, with more compliant products expected.
Ascent Solar testing CIGS modules for power beaming, marine applications
The US-based developer of copper indium gallium selenide thin-film PV products said its modules will be tested without modifications by companies developing marine PV and power beaming applications.
Machine learning-based fault detection technique for bifacial PV
A UAE research team developed a hybrid 1D-CNN and random forest model to detect multiple faults in bifacial PV systems, including dust, shading, aging, and cracks. Using simulated I-V curves and a 180-day synthetic dataset, the model achieved up to 100% accuracy in general state detection and 97.6% in specific fault classification.
