Strategic Alliances

The African Development Bank has agreed to invest $200 million to improve electricity access in Nigeria by building minigrids throughout the country.

The move has been welcomed as a step in the right direction by lobby group SolarPower Europe nevertheless, particularly as it envisages bringing together EU low-carbon businesses. The outline ambition will now be considered by the European Parliament.

Charlotte has become the first U.S. municipality to come to terms with Duke Energy on a solar contract through the new Green Source Advantage program.

A Japanese consortium has started producing solar-powered ‘urban furniture’. The result is a solar-plus-battery bench with cooling elements and vaporizers.

French oil and gas company Total is planning to install nearly 500 MW of solar generation capacity on farmland by 2025. The power company will work with French seed and agricultural supply company inVivo group to install agrivoltaic systems.

Interfloat Corporation, a European market leader for solar glass, has been bought by Holzverarbeiter HS Timber Group and Blue Minds.

Researchers led by Belgian institute imec claim to have achieved the result with a 1cm² perovskite tandem solar cell. The result tops the 24.6% efficiency the consortium announced in September 2018. The cell’s developers are now aiming for 30%.

Zhang Ping, a 30-year coal-fired power industry veteran, has taken the helm at Hong Kong-listed Panda Green, days after a $230 million bail-out by state-owned Beijing Energy Holding Co Ltd.

Banco Sabadell has acquired a 41.5% interest in Pamplona-based STI Norland through its Aurica Capita fund.

The twice-postponed $230 million investment which will see Chinese state-owned Beijing Energy acquire a 32% stake in Hong Kong-listed developer Panda Green has finally gone through. The developer now has five months to drum up enough to pay off two more of its other three state-owned backers.