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Calls for barriers and duties are resurfacing in Europe as solar module prices sharply fall. German PV analyst Karl-Heinz Remmers recalls the 2009-13 period, when the European Union introduced anti-dumping and anti-subsidy duties. This drove the loss of 80,000 jobs in the solar industry, despite or perhaps because of the tariffs on PV modules and raw materials.

In a new weekly update for pv magazine, OPIS, a Dow Jones company, provides a quick look at the main price trends in the global PV industry.

The Chinese manufacturer also inked new strategic cooperation agreements while displaying the new line of solar modules at RE+ 2023 in Las Vegas.

The South African authorities awarded project agreements to two wind-solar-storage hybrid projects that were selected in a 2 GW tech-neutral tender held under the Risk Mitigation Independent Power Producers Procurement Programme (RMIPPPP) in 2021.

Hydrogen is nothing new, but it could become a decarbonized energy vector to transform renewable electrons into renewable fuels, displacing fossil fuels in multiple applications. Laurence Boisramé, global director of hydrogen at Bureau Veritas, recently spoke with pv magazine about improving hydrogen market transparency, but she noted that “global consensus will take time – at least a few years.”

The European Solar Manufacturing Council (ESMC) is urging the European Union to adopt legislation against forced labor in the PV industry, by explicitly calling for measures to prevent solar products produced with forced labor from entering the European market.

Swiss scientists claim no distribution grid expansion is needed to increase the share of solar PV in energy systems, but they warn that priority dispatch for PV during peak loads may become a serious issue in the years to come. Among a range of recommendations, they proposed reducing peak loads by developing grid-serving behavior with PV system owners having to do their part.

The rise of cost-effective TOPCon cell technology last year led to a ‘surge’ in production demand for solar n-type cell technology, with leading industry analysts TrendForce prophesying PERC cell capacities ‘may’ be phased out in two to three years. The company’s experts, however, warn that oversupply for p-type cells and modules may increase the price gap between n-type and p-type products in the upcoming months.

Almost every weekend since Easter, European generators have been paid to power down plants but some Northern European nations are experiencing record electricity prices. An energy system set up for fossil fuels is in urgent need of reform, according to Gerard Reid, co-founder and partner of Alexa Capital.

Ampace says its new battery cell technology has a 15,000-cycle lifetime. It is suitable for stationary and solar power storage applications, with a potential lifespan of up to 20 years.