Technology and R&D

Australian gravity storage startup Green Gravity has revealed that it will build a new R&D facility in the Australian state of New South Wales.

UK-based Ideal Heating has developed an air-source heat pump for the UK residential market. It is available in two versions with a heating output of 8.2 kW or 10.3 kW and uses R32 as the refrigerant. It says the heat pump can be paired with rooftop solar to maximize self-consumption.

The Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (ISE) has replaced the 2011 UL 1699B standard with its new IEC 63027 standard for inverters, incorporating arc fault detectors. The objective is to improve safety and efficiency in inverter technology.

Swedish scientists have created a contract to help renewable energy producers and retailers to pay high imbalance costs. The new framework could boost clean energy profits by up to 4.8% and retail profits by more than 7%, claim the researchers.

Spanish researchers have studied the potential of rooftop PV in microbreweries and have found that solar could cut the cost of heating and refrigeration by nearly 30%. They say that coupling PV with small breweries could result in payback times ranging from 4.3 to 6.6 years.

India will use its internal market to scale up hydrogen projects, with Germany as a possible export destination. As part of a broader strategy, the countries will collaborate on a financial and technological level on energy transition projects.

FuturaSun is betting on a vertical integration strategy with the launch of a 10 GW solar cell factory in Huai’an, China. It aims to start production in spring 2024.

A Chinese research group has combined compressed CO2 with combined heating and power (CHP) units for renewable energy storage. The system has achieved a total energy efficiency of 35.96% and an energy storage density of 1.54 kWh/m3.

First Solar has agreed to pay $38 million to buy Swedish manufacturing startup Evolar AB, as it seeks to expand development of high-efficiency tandem PV tech.

Powered by installation robots, on-site assembly line and digital twin software, the Terabase automated power plant construction system aims to boost productivity and cut construction costs.