Western Europe

The government of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern has allocated €10 million ($9.93 million) to support the deployment of balcony solar modules with a power output of up to 600 W.

The German authorities reviewed bids with a total capacity of 767 MW and selected projects totaling 201 MW. The final prices ranged between €0.0820 ($0.0813)/kWh and €0.0891/kWh. The final average price was €0.084.

SEV, the utility for the Faroe Islands, has secured funds from Nordic Investment Bank to build a pumped hydro storage facility on the island of Streymoy. The Mýruverkið II project, valued at DKK 1.3 billion ($174 million), is set to go online in the 2027-28 period.

Japanese researchers have developed a new way to improve water splitting, while South Korea has completed its largest hydrogen production complex. Scotland and England have announced new hydrogen investments, and Uzbekistan and Saudi Arabia’s ACWA Power have agreed to collaborate on hydrogen projects.

The Swiss Federal Council has amended the National Roads Ordinance to allow the country to generate renewable energy on free surfaces along major thoroughfares, such as noise barriers and rest areas.

An international group of researchers has developed a cubical luminescent solar concentrator (LSC) PV device that can be assembled in mosaic configurations for applications in urban environments. The best-performing device achieved a power conversion efficiency of 11.6%.

Germany’s Liontron said it can prepare 300 cups of coffee per day from the PV modules and storage tech on its bicycles for beverage vendors. This means its mobile coffee shops can operate without grid connections.

A Swedish-Italian research group has applied state-of-the-art models for global horizontal irradiance decomposition to assess photosynthetically active radiation in agrivoltaic projects – an important variable to properly predict crop yield.

Dutch manufacturer MG Energy Systems is offering a new storage system in two versions, with capacities of 5.8 kWh and 7.2 kWh and nominal capacities of 230 Ah and 280 Ah.

The Community of Communes of Haute-Saintonge on the mid-Atlantic coast of France has picked BayWa r.e. to develop an innovative hybrid project on the site of the Pôle Mécanique de la Haute Saintonge.