Policy

Although decried for lacking ambition and as an abdication of responsibility in some quarters, the climate law proposed by the European Commission may be more ambitious than it first appears, as Felicia Jackson, from the center for sustainable finance of the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London – considers here.

The Dubai Electricity and Water Authority’s new research facility at the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park will primarily focus on solar power, energy efficiency, and the integration of smart grids.

Lobby group the National Solar Energy Federation of India has welcomed the move and asked the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy to extend any such measures to existing contracts to help developers meet working capital requirements.

The 8 MW facility has been developed by a cement producer to supply around 10% of the annual electricity needs of its nearby factory. Under subsidy-free rules, the power will be bought by the Electricity Authority of Cyprus for the average price it would have paid if the electricity had come from fossil fuels.

Developers are also expected to drag their heels over project completion during the first half of the year as the safeguarding duty applied to imported Chinese and Malaysian solar products is due to expire at the end of July.

The Australian federal government said last week that it will curtail funding for the five-year Energy Transition Hub research initiative.

European Parliament groupings, renewable energy associations and climate activists have voiced disappointment at the EU Climate Law officially unveiled yesterday. Lack of a raised emission-reduction ambition to 2030 is at the heart of the opposition, with critics saying the plan will be insufficient to help prevent global temperatures rising more than 1.5 degrees Celsius.

U.S. researchers have investigated whether energy storage deployment could actually drive up greenhouse gas emissions in the short term in some energy markets. The fact the existing literature considers only the dispatch of energy from storage facilities in the current fossil fuel-renewables energy mix, though, could understate the long-term emissions reduction benefits of such facilities.

The European Commission today officially presented its Green Deal bill. Though the law has been welcomed in principle by environmental organizations, the provisions are not seen to be ambitious or concrete enough – and 12 EU member states already want to speed up decarbonization.

The state government has partnered with the German energy storage company to offer 188 families locally assembled sonnenBatteries as they rebuild their homes.