Renewables

A 245 kWh mobile storage solution from Swedish manufacturer Northvolt was connected to an operational section of a PV plant under construction in Sweden to replace diesel power generators. According to the project developer, around 500 kW of the operational capacity of the solar park will be enough to power the site’s operations through the battery.

A U.S. court decision has reduced the Section 201 tariff rate from 18% to 15%, following a rate increase as part of Trump’s Proclamation 10101 in October 2020.

Japanese energy company Sinanen offers a scalable solar carport that can host a minimum of four vehicles and can be deployed in the parking areas of factories and commercial buildings. The basic system is offered with a minimum capacity of 10.80 kW.

South Korean researchers have developed a process to produce ultra-thin wafers without sacrificing any of the substrates. Their technique is based on a new approach involving the use of plasma-assisted epitaxial growth, in order to increase internal defects and porosity, rather than reduce them.

According to Chinese researchers, using abandoned coal mine goaves for pumped hydro facilities in combination with large scale solar and wind is not only technically feasible but can also provide an efficiency of 82.8% in yearly operation cases. They applied the model to wind and solar-rich northwestern and southwestern China.

IHS Markit predicts that global installed solar PV capacity will grow by 20% to over 200 GW in 2022, despite a difficult cost environment. PV system costs are expected to resume their downward trend from 2023, when more polysilicon capacities will come into operation.

EDF is planning to build a 240 MW floating PV project at Laos’ largest hydropower dam. French engineering company Innosea has joined the ambitious project as a provider of support for wave and anchoring studies.

The procurement exercise’s final average price is 3% lower than that of the previous tender of the same kind. Around 636 MW of PV capacity was allocated by the French authorities.

Australian miner IGO is building upon its renewable energy options at its Nova nickel operation after signing an agreement with Perth-based energy storage company VSUN Energy to test a hybrid standalone power system backed by a vanadium redox flow battery.

The Antípodas project was announced by the Chilean government last week. It is aimed at taking advantage of the huge solar potential of the Atacama Desert, which is the world’s region with the highest solar radiation.