Italy

International investments in large-scale solar plants, combined with repowering and current support schemes, could trigger a PV boom in Italy, says Germany-based technical advisor PI Berlin.

Developed by Swedish scientists, the proposed algorithm is said to calculate a project’s ideal design by combining climatological data with figures on expected solar power generation, shading distribution, water for irrigation, and agricultural yield. Its creators spoke with pv magazine about the key parameters that the model seeks to determine, one of which is the optimal distance between the solar module rows depending on the kind of crop.

The funds will be part of the EU Covid-19 recovery package. Overall, the Italian government expects to deploy 2 GW of agrivoltaics and 2 GW through energy communities.

Italy’s Council of State has issued a new ruling that bodes well for renewables development. The consultative body has clarified a number of principles related to permits, but caution is still required.

Italian start-up Genius Watter has developed a solar desalination solution that is claimed to be particularly suitable for remote areas with no connection to grid electricity. The system is able to produce up to 1,000 cubic meters of potable water per day at an opex of €0.20 per cubic meter.

The court has agreed with advocate-general Henrik Saugmandsgaard Øe that Italy’s move, in 2014, to reduce solar incentive payments contained in signed agreements held by developers does not breach EU law.

New research by Aurora Energy Research expects new unsubsidized solar PV capacity to grow to 5 GW by 2025, 12 GW by 2030, 32 by 2035, and 57 GW by 2040.

Instead of splurging €11 billion of EU cash on uneconomic new generation capacity, the Italian authorities–and electricity bill payers–would be better served investing in a mix of current clean power technologies which would include almost 17 GW more solar capacity.

An energy community in northern Italy will integrate a PV installation with a storage system to power 48 households of a social housing project and a fleet of rented electric vehicles. It is a collective effort that could be replicable as soon as 2023.

The Italian PV market saw a year-on-year decrease in new PV installations last year. Residential PV systems up to 20 kW in size still accounted for the largest share, at around 250.4 MW of capacity.