This week, Women in Solar Europe (WiSEu Network) takes a significant step by shedding light on health and safety issues for women in the solar and energy storage industry, a crucial topic that gained even more relevance after the observance of World Day for Safety and Health at Work on April 28th.

In a new weekly update for pv magazine, Solcast, a DNV company, reports that April’s weather in Europe presented a north-south divide impacting solar generation across the continent. High pressure systems over the Mediterranean meant sunnier than normal conditions in Southern Europe, benefitting PV output.

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.

If solar-powered irrigation pumps can be rolled out in a responsible manner at scale, the impact on agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa could be transformational.

As the world becomes increasingly roiled by extreme weather, drone-based electroluminescence (EL) mapping can be a key weapon in the arsenal of solar investors.

The latest supply chain report from the Hong Kong-based technical compliance and quality assurance company covers India, providing information about current and planned capacity at 116 manufacturing plants.

Carbon, a French PV module maker, says its new €1.7 billion ($1.8 billion) manufacturing facility will initially produce TOPCon products.

Japan’s Asahi Kasei is testing a new alkaline water electrolyzer, while China has started developing its first 100 kg vehicle-mounted liquid hydrogen system.

According to new data from trade body UNEF, Spain reached 1.823 MWh of cumulative storage capacity at the end of December 2023.

The Selfmade Energy online platform says that prices for PV systems and battery storage systems fell by more than 4% between November 2023 and March 2024. In March, for example, 6 kW PV systems without batteries were sold for between €1.66 ($1.79)/W and €2.10/W.

Development of green hydrogen production in Europe is moving forward in fits and starts, but the ongoing World Hydrogen 2024 event in Rotterdam calls for blue hydrogen adoption, which suggests that the oil and gas industry aims to maintain control of the hydrogen market. 

The Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB) and China Huadian Corp. have agreed to install 160 MW of PV in Bangladesh. The solar facility will be deployed in an area that was originally designated to host a coal power plant.

The Austrian manufacturer said its new heat pump can achieve a seasonal coefficient of performance of up to 4.7 and flow temperatures of up to 75 C. It is available with sizes ranging from 2 kW to 7 kW.

A group of scientists in Thailand has outlined a new approach to avoid oversizing and overvoltage in energy markets applying volt-watt droop curtailment strategies. The novel methodology leads to a reduction in a PV system’s net present value but also increases its levelized cost of energy.

The European Commission has shared updated documents with its member states for speeding up permitting procedures and designing auctions for renewables. It includes the use of non-price criteria in auctions, which the commission says will allow higher value-added projects to be rewarded.

Developed through bandgap engineering and material design, the proposed PV device relies on a tin-based perovskite material known as CsSnI3-xBrx. It can reportedly be further designed to achieve power conversion efficiencies exceeding 24%.

Scientists have investigated different techno-economic scenarios for using hydrogen storage in combination with hydropower and pumped hydro storage in Switzerland. They have found that hydrogen storage plays no major role under most conditions.

Renew Home, a partnership between Google Nest Renew and OhmConnect, aims to expand from 3 GW of electrical energy use to 50 GW by 2030.

AGL Energy has completed the installation of a solar-powered microgrid with a 5.4 MWh battery energy storage system in Australia to support the transition of a commercial orchard’s operations from diesel to renewables.

A research group in China has tested how membrane-based floating PV platforms can operate in offgrid scenarios. Their analysis showed that, especially with high wave frequencies, this kind of floating PV installation may suffer from the floater bending stiffness, which could limit both in-plane and out-of-plane motion amplitude.

Grew Energy has started building a 3.2 GW ingot-module factory in India. The facility will produce 2.8 GW of ingots, wafers, and cells per year, along with 3.2 GW of high-efficiency PV modules.

Indian scientists have designed an off-grid power system that relies on solar panels, lithium-ion batteries and Ćuk converters. The converters are the crucial components that enable the system to deal with varying input voltage due to changing sunlight conditions.

The number of module assembly businesses in Türkiye continues to rise but, despite protectionist moves to support domestic manufacturing, consolidation appears likely. Ambitions abroad, expansion at home, and interest from Chinese suppliers, were all on show at the recent SolarEX trade fair in Istanbul.

Trina Solar says its solar panel shipments reached 65.21 GW in 2023. The Chinese module maker achieved a turnover of $15.75 billion and a net profit of $768.2 million in fiscal 2023, with an annual module production capacity of 95 GW by the end of December.

Guangdong Electric Power Development (GDEP) has bought 118 MW of Trina Solar panels for $0.12/W. It says it will use the modules for several solar projects in China’s Shandong province.

PosHYdon says it wants to validate the integration of three energy systems in the Dutch North Sea: offshore wind, offshore gas, and offshore hydrogen. The project will involve the installation of a hydrogen plant on the Neptune Energy (Eni) Q13a-A platform.

Lightsource bp says it plans to develop a solar-plus-storage facility in Ireland. The proposed installation will feature a 57 MW solar array and a 54 MW energy storage system on an open grassland site in the eastern part of the country.

Sinovoltaics has released its latest energy storage manufacturers ranking report, based on balance sheet assessments and publicly available financial information. It lists US-based Tesla as number one, followed by South Korean’s LG Energy Solution, Taiwan-based Kung Long Battery, China’s Mustang Battery, along with US-based Solid Power in the top five.

The authorities in Ireland have opened a €20 million ($21.5 million) fund for energy research and innovation. It will support projects contributing to the nation’s clean energy transition, such as heat decarbonization and energy storage.

UK scientists have proposed a way to combine photovoltaic-thermal energy with Stirling engines and battery storage in residential buildings. Despite the high upfront costs, they said the cost-effective hybrid co-generation system could significantly reduce CO2 emissions.