Solar square off – 09-2016
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Excerpt from the magazine
The eyes have it
Visual inspection tooling: Automated optical imaging is becoming a more common feature in PV cell production today. From the color sorting, right through to detailed process control, a range of optical imaging approaches and technologies are shedding the light required to deliver quality, increase average efficiencies, and enhance yield.
Aug 18, 2016
Smart home market battle widens Given the central importance of solar generation to a smart home today, solar monitoring plays an incumbent role in the control and command of usage. However, the ultimate user interface between the user and the smart home is fast evolving through the use of intense electronics programming among dozens of […]
Aug 18, 2016
Solar smarts When we talk about intelligent interaction between photovoltaic systems and the electric grid, the inverter is the key piece of hardware. Not only does it convert DC power to AC while matching the voltage, frequency, and phase of the grid, but increasingly inverters are being asked to do more to support the grid, […]
Aug 18, 2016
Microgrids – Smart renewable energy clusters provide independence from the grid Microgrids are defined as a group of interconnected loads and distributed energy resources (DERs) within clearly-defined electrical boundaries that act as a single controllable entity with respect to the grid. They offer a potentially cheaper, more reliable and environmentally friendly alternative to traditional centralized […]
Aug 18, 2016
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Enel and its global presence
Enel insight: Multinational power company Enel has in recent years placed renewable energy production center stage, boasting a highly diverse network of power plants ranging from hydroelectric to thermoelectric, nuclear, wind, and solar. pv magazine spoke with Antonio Cammisecra, head of global renewables business development, about the strategy and role of Enel in the solar industry, and its future market and technological goals.
Aug 18, 2016
Company Vignettes The Solar-Log 370 is an advanced residential solar PV monitoring device with grid feed-in control. The residential revenue-grade meter combines the Solar-Log monitoring technology with GE’s popular 1-210+ meter. Optional features include automatic incentive reporting, self-consumption metering, inverter direct monitoring for near real-time visualization of plant data, connection to weather sensors, remote disconnect, and […]
Aug 18, 2016
Capital punishment
Corporate funding update: Solar total corporate funding continues to decline, hitting a new low of $1.7 billion in the second quarter, says Mercom Capital CEO Raj Prabhu. However, residential and commercial project funds have picked up steam, attracting $1.4 billion in investment a 36% increase.
Aug 18, 2016
Smart Renewable Energy: Across 20 pages pv magazine examines the latest trends as enabling technology allows PV and other renewables to get smart. It’s the curse that comes with success. But perhaps it’s a blessing. As PV and other renewable energy sources continue to play a larger role as a generation source in electricity grids […]
Aug 18, 2016
Germany’s Daimler is beginning to use its expertise in the electric vehicle space to deliver high quality storage systems for commercial markets. Go big AND go home Large-scale storage: Germany’s pioneering approach to all things PV has spilled over into battery storage at scale, attracting the attentions of car giant Mercedes-Benz in the process. Alongside […]
Aug 18, 2016
Disruption in building services What is the biggest challenge for the Internet of Things in the home? Viktor Grinewitschus: There is one fundamental question that is really important for the industry: Where is the value creation? How do manufacturers define themselves and what is the functionality of their devices? If you make a device completely […]
Aug 18, 2016
From commodity to differentiation
A snapshot of market pressures: Gäetan Masson, director of the Becquerel Institute, muses on the various trends and opinions currently shaping global solar markets, not least the notion of PV-as-a-commodity and the industrys ability or lack thereof to move with the times.
Aug 18, 2016
Why, robot
Automation in PV: With huge leaps made in automation of PV module production facilities over the past decade, module quality and output have seen dramatic increases. However, differences still exist among tier-1 manufacturers in terms of relative levels of automation, with some manufacturers choosing not to automate certain process steps for reasons of cost, flexibility and even quality. George Touloupas of Clean Energy Associates examines the major pros and cons for automation of key process steps, and asks why some have chosen one approach over the other.
Aug 18, 2016
Breaking the rules Just as the physical grid was designed for one-way flow of electricity from centralized generation to distributed loads, political and regulatory structures are also based on this centralized architecture. As such, these structures have had a difficult time adapting to a new reality of two-way flows of electricity, with multiple services supplied […]
Aug 18, 2016
Stories from the electricity market Peter in Munich shares his power with Paul in Flensburg and Martha in Frankfurt. That is the claim on the sonnenCommunity website, where a bold headline promises “It’s time to declare your independence.” At Senec it goes like this: “Mission: 100% independence,” and, “With the Senec-Cloud you’ll store up unneeded […]
Aug 18, 2016
Keeping track of time
Time-of-use savings: Bringing an average of 20% more energy to large-scale plants than those with fixed arrays, the benefits of single and double-axis trackers are even more apparent when state time-of-use charges are taken into account, helping large-scale solar plants to be good citizens of U.S. grids.
Aug 18, 2016
Boom time in Texas
Texas at scale: Texas has been only a modest solar market to date, but that is changing fast. A boom started by municipal utilities and enabled by free transmission is expected to lead to a massive amount of utility-scale solar coming online over the next five years, and even more over the next decade.
Aug 18, 2016
One nation under the sun
Bangladesh: In contrast to India, which is the undisputed regional solar PV star that attracts all of the attention and most of the investment, neighboring Bangladesh is leading a quiet off-grid solar power revolution that has begun to alter societal dynamics. The nation is now ready to expand solar to its grids too. pv magazine offers a market and policy update on Bangladesh.
Aug 18, 2016
Residential energy storage gets smarter Residential storage installs were up 5% during the first quarter of this year, according to GTM Research. But Navigant Consulting suggests that global residential energy storage will grow from 95 MW today to 3.8 GW by 2025. Within that market, North American residential storage is expected to rise 55% from 15 MW today […]
Aug 18, 2016
Good times, bad times in the USA India goes for gold
It’s a fascinating time to be covering solar in the U.S. With the extension of the federal ITC we are looking forward to another year of dramatic growth across the nation, with multiple GW of solar projects under construction and solar contract prices that continue to redefine what we think of as cheap energy. Policy […]
Aug 18, 2016
