The global renewable energy industry had a record-breaking year in 2015, according to the REN21 2016 Renewables Global Status Report, with 147GW of renewable generating capacity added worldwide – the […]
Tag: europe
Developing countries set the example for ‘energy democracy’
The former chief executive of America’s biggest electricity utility, Duke Energy, says it take distributed energy technologies like solar and storage to bring energy democracy to the world’s developing countries […]
Europe’s ‘Nice Grid’ project aims to change the grid as we know it
‘Smart grid’ has been a buzzword in the renewable energy/electricity sphere for years now. A European pilot program – ‘Nice Grid‘ – seeks to make the renewables-friendly, distributed generation-centric microgrid dream […]
Aussie property developers could skip grid to design microgrid-powered communities
Australian property developers are exploring the option of not connecting newly built housing estates to the electricity grid, but instead offering solar and storage as part of a standard package, industry […]
CSIRO scientists commission solar-powered desalination plant for Cyprus
Scientists from Australia’s CSIRO have designed and installed a solar thermal power plant with molten salt storage on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus. The small, 150kW facility is being used […]
2015 International Technology Roadmap for Photovoltaics released
The 2015 International Technology Roadmap for Photovoltaics (ITRPV) was released last week and is now available for download on the ITRPV website. The report contains insights from leading PV industry […]
Renewables will be key in meeting global climate targets: HSBC report
Renewable energy technologies like solar and wind are now cost competitive with fossil fuels in many parts of the world, a new HSBC report has found, and will play a […]
Australia lags behind much of Western world in per-capita renewable capacity
Australia’s record on installed renewable energy, measured on a per capita basis, lags behind North America and most of Europe, a new report has shown. In the HSBC report, The […]
Energy storage will boom amid burgeoning US solar market
Nearly 10 per cent of all solar systems in North America would have energy included in as little as three years’ time, a new study has found. IHS said on Monday that, […]
IEA outlines position with energy storage roadmap
The International Energy Agency has released their inaugural energy storage roadmap. A logical addition to their various renewable energy roadmaps, the report aims to project the role energy storage technologies […]
36GW of large-scale solar power now installed globally
According the preliminary figures released by Wiki-Solar late last month, global utility-scale photovoltaics added 14.2GW in 2014, which doubled the 2013 total and brought total generating capacity to 35.9GW in […]
Two new Apple data centres to run on renewables
Apple has announced plans to build two large data storage centers in Europe: one in Ireland and the other in Denmark. The $1.9 billion (€1.7 billion) investment, Apple’s largest ever […]
German study predicts that cheapest electricity will come from solar by 2050
Solar PV will be the cheapest form of power within a decade, and cost less than $US0.02/kWh by 2050, a major German study has predicted.The study, by Berlin-based think tank […]
Australia’s Redflow to fast-track rollout of ‘flow batteries’ for homes, businesses and mining operations
Australian energy storage company Redflow says it is fast-tracking the rollout of its battery products to the residential and mining sector, in yet another sign that storage costs are falling […]
Labor’s landslide in Queensland election could spell sunny future for solar
Campbell Newman’s loss in the Queensland state election on the weekend could be solar’s gain, as attention turns to the Labor party’s renewable energy policy. Queensland’s Labor Party unveiled its solar […]
German utility giant E.ON splits in two in order to focus on renewables
Europe’s largest power utility has announced plans to dump conventional, fossil fuel energy generation and focus instead on renewables and customer-led distributed generation solutions. In what has been described as […]
Australia-China solar panel anti-dumping investigation further delayed until March 2015
An investigation by the Australian Anti-Dumping Commission (ADC) into certain crystalline silicon solar panels imported from China has been put off until next to next year due to the ADC’s […]
‘Socket parity’ just around the corner for solar-plus-storage in many countries: Citi
Solar power could reach “socket parity” in some countries as soon as 2020, and utility-scale grid parity in large parts of the world by 2030, according to a major new […]
Electric vehicles will help revolutionise solar & home energy independence: UBS
Electric vehicles and the proliferation of battery storage will solve the problem of intermittent supply for rooftop solar, and make it viable without subsidies, a new report has predicted. The […]
Renewable energy investment reached $63.6b in Q2 2014: BNEF
A record-breaking $3.8 billion deal to finance an offshore wind farm in the North Sea has helped to deliver the strongest quarter for clean energy investment in two years. Global […]
Renewables provided 30% of Germany’s electricity in first 6 months of 2014
Record amounts of solar and wind energy generation in Germany have helped push the country’s share of renewables to 31 per cent of electricity production for the first half of […]
Energy storage at center of discussion at Intersolar Europe 2014
Energy storage has dominated discussion in the opening days of the world’s biggest solar conference, the Intersolar Europe 2014 in Munich, with industry leaders pinpointing it as a major component of the […]
Sunny Australia’s solar uptake lags behind dreary UK’s
Queensland continues to remain the hot-spot for rooftop solar installations in Australia, accounting for much of the installs in the month of March, and showing an increase as falls were […]
SunPower CEO: Australia could be a world leader in distributed energy & solar PV
Australia has been named as a potential leader in the global shift towards decentralised renewable energy generation by the head of one of the world’s biggest solar manufacturers – provided […]
EU project promises commercial organic solar cells
A new European Commission-funded research project may bring organic solar cells closer to commercialisation. Germany’s Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) recently announced the creation of the “MatHero” project supported by […]
Uncertainty over future of renewable energy support mechanisms driving investors away from Australia
Australia is in danger of losing investors in clean energy options such as solar and wind energy, and in carbon abatement, because of the uncertainty around environmental legislation. Several key […]
Nearly half of the global 95GW solar PV plant pipeline comprised of projects no larger than 5MW
Medium-sizes power plants will account for nearly half of the new solar PV capacity to be built in the world’s leading solar markets over the next few years, according market […]
Rooftop solar already less expensive than grid power–even in Europe
A report from the biggest solar research centre in Europe suggests that rooftop solar PV is clearly cheaper than electricity sourced from the grid – even in northern European countries […]
Solar power poised to go big-time in Africa
A recent article from CNN news shines a light on the solar boom is currently underway in Africa. In particular, the country of South Africa now boasts the highest renewable […]
