Mexico

With figures at the end of last year boosted by profitable PV project sales, the manufacturer and developer is now nursing unflattering comparisons and aims to get more projects built and sold by the end of next month.

With clean energy being generated at lower and lower prices around the world, solar power is playing a leading role in bringing the curtain down on coal, and will help the decarbonization of transport and space heating too.

Zodiac Aerospace Equipo de Mexico has agreed to buy solar power from a 13 MW slice of the 80 MW Los Santos Solar II project in the Mexican state of Chihuahua.

While the world’s biggest solar manufacturers are confident there are plenty of alternative markets for a rising volume of panel exports, the message spelled out by first-quarter shipment figures is that protectionism works.

After two decades of growth, the amount of newly installed renewable energy capacity is no longer rising and, despite a 7% growth in electricity generation from clean energy sources, global energy-related carbon emissions have risen 1.7%.

Located in the town of La Paz, in Baja California Sur, the Aura Solar III plant has a generation capacity of 32 MW and includes a lithium-ion battery storage system with a capacity of 10.5 MW/7.0 MWh.

The energy program will initially relate to combined cycle gas power plants with a capacity of 2.76 GW. No mention was made in electric utility CFE’s official statement of the possibility of increasing capacity by harnessing renewables.

The world had more than half a terawatt of PV generation capacity at the end of last year as emerging solar markets picked up the slack caused by Beijing’s subsidy about-turn to the tune of a 20% rise in installations outside China.

The Japanese gas provider has acquired a 50% interest in four Mexican PV projects with a combined capacity of 746 MW. The new joint venture will further develop solar and renewables across the country.

The announcement was given by Manuel Bartlett, the general director of state-owned utility CFE. He also said the current prices of renewables are a lie, while also stressing that their development is a factor determining higher electricity prices.