Germany

Chinese battery manufacturer Svolt has cancelled plans to open a plant in the German state of Brandenburg. Meanwhile, its plans for cell production in Saarland, southwest Germany, continue to be delayed.

Merger and acquisition (M&A) activity has been heating up in Germany but increased competition and high interest rates are affecting renewables project values. Baris Serifsoy, partner at GreenCap Partners, examines the investment landscape in one of the world’s most developed PV markets.

Solarwatt says it will shut down its battery factory in Germany. Battery production at the Dresden facility will halt at the end of this year, and the company will move all battery and solar panel production to China.

Perovskite PV devices are set to become the next big thing in solar with market analysts at S&P Global Commodity Insights predicting 1 GW of production by the end of 2024, rising to 6 GW in 2025. Perovskite tandem devices are at the front of the queue for commercialization but their characterization presents technical challenges.

Nikola plans to sell 100 hydrogen fuel-cell trucks for logistic operations in California, Volvo has started developing hydrogen combustion trucks, and Airbus has announced plans to launch a study into hydrogen projects in the US state of Georgia.

BloombergNEF (BNEF) says in a new study of 1,600 planned hydrogen projects that governments will miss their 2030 hydrogen targets. Analyst Adithya Bhashyam tells pv magazine that most of the announced projects to the end of this decade lack the key conditions for success.

Novel research from Germany and the USA has analyzed the impact of heat pump (HP) integration on the ability of day-ahead load forecasting in energy communities. Using different models, the scientists have also investigated whether HP loads should be forecasted separately from the rest of the household or both together.

The subsidiary of Chinese-Canadian solar manufacturer Canadian Solar says the financing will go towards developing and constructing solar and battery energy storage projects across Spain, Italy, the UK, the Netherlands, France and Germany.

Christian Victor, an X (formerly Twitter) user, has published a new map showing land consumption in Germany. It reveals that open-cast mines occupy more square meters than ground-mounted solar arrays and wind farms combined.

Adnoc has delivered the world’s first certified bulk commercial shipment of low-carbon ammonia to a client in Japan, while Plug Power has agreed to supply a 3 GW electrolyzer in Australia.