Europe

Aurora Energy Research says it has recorded a sharp increase in green hydrogen projects, with 90% of them in early phases of development, while E.ON says that Germany’s hydrogen ramp-up is stuck due to an investment backlog.

The German parliament has approved “Solarpaket 1,” a policy package that includes higher feed-in tariffs for commercial and industrial (C&I) solar projects and new measures related to the size of eligible installations in large-scale solar auctions.

The France-based group said its has released two new BESSs with enclosures of 7ft and 20ft. Their power ranges from 60 kW to 500 kW.

In another article of a series, Women in Solar Europe (WiSEu) gives voice to Claire Gardner, Marketing Manager Europe at Chinese inverter manufacturer Solis. She tells how she had to deal with her own insecurities rather than with a women-hostile environment at the beginning of her career in the renewable energy industry.

Swiss consulting firm Pexapark noted a rise in European power purchase agreement (PPA) prices in March, for the first monthly increase since August 2023. It recorded 18 PPAs in March, totaling 718 MW, with solar accounting for 398 MW across nine deals.

German and Swedish researchers calculated the supply of materials to produce perovskite tandem PV at a multi-terawatt-scale, flagging the difficult supply of gold, indium and cesium, well as a need to streamline production of certain materials used for hole-transport layers. “In essence, we might be able to go post-fossil fuels, but we can’t go post-minerals,” the research’s corresponding author, Lukas Wagner, told pv magazine.

The European Parliament has approved the Net-Zero Industry Act, which now awaits formal adoption by the European Council to become law. The European Solar Manufacturing Council has welcomed the decision, saying that it “gives a green light for procurement of sustainable European-made solar panels.”

The Irish authorities have presented a new plan to allow homeowners to borrow between €5,000 ($5,350) and €75,000 for up to 10 years, with low interest rates. Heat pumps, solar electricity and solar water heater installations are all eligible under the scheme.

Greek renewables developer Elica SA is seeking consultants for two desktop studies related to an electrical interconnection project between Greece and Egypt. The undersea link will transmit green energy to Europe via a 3 GW HDVC connection.