Employment

The government of the state of Victoria will fund a floating PV array and an initiative to locally manufacture solar batteries and install a portable renewable energy system for community services during emergencies, as part of its Latrobe Valley program.

The 22 nations which have had their “recovery and resilience” spending plans approved by the European Commission are set to devote billions to clean energy facilities, with the cash set to be disbursed in three payments to the end of next year.

The EU’s executive body will supply €10 million to the European Battery Academy program launched in Brussels yesterday which aims to train the 800,000 battery workforce it has been estimated will be required in three years’ time.

Last year’s figures marked the first time the market saw sustained, subsidy-free growth across residential, commercial and utility scale projects, according to trade body Solar Energy UK.

The $87 million Kesses solar project, in Kenya’s Rift Valley town of Eldoret, is set for completion by Spanish developer Alten this year.

The off-grid solar supplier said the fact its latest finance package is denominated in local currency will help encourage African commercial banks to be more ready to back PV.

Cape Town-based solar crowdfunding platform The Sun Exchange in April announced completion of its largest funding call, for US$1.4 million to finance what it described as a 510kW solar-plus-storage facility for Zimbawean food company Nhimbe Fresh. With the first part of a planned three-phase “going solar” transformation of the business complete, pv magazine spoke to The Sun Exchange founder and CEO Abraham Cambridge, and to Nhimbe Fresh chairman Edwin Masimba Moyo.

The national goals set by European countries two years ago already look hopelessly out of date thanks to the global PV boom. The Euro trade association for the industry has called for ambitions to be radically scaled up in 2023 if the world is to have any chance of capping temperature rises at 1.5C.

The partners behind a JV aiming to develop a lithium conversion factory in Portugal say Iberia could supply enough geological feedstock spodumene to produce 700,000 EV batteries per year, starting in 2026.

The Euro trade body has promised to monitor the developing solar jobs market annually from now on, and pointed to Poland’s position at the top of the tree of EU member states for PV jobs last year as evidence the technology can still benefit from legislative backing.