Your daily dose of photovoltaic technology developments and solar news

Pilkington North America, based in Toledo, Ohio, will collaborate with Dyesol to develop opportunities in the building integrated photovoltaics (BIPV) market. The partnership will utilize Pilkington's TEC series of transparent conductive oxide (TCO) coated float glass and Dyesol's dye solar cell (DSC) materials and technology.

Ascent Solar has received certification for its premier and two meter flexible CIGS modules from an independent laboratory using a variety of U.S. department of defense military ruggedization standards known as MIL-STD-810G.

Johns Manville (JM) has reached an agreement with SolarFrameWorks that will see the latter supply its proprietary BIPV CoolPly solar roofing components to JM, who will market these products through its JM E³ Company.

Scheuten Solar has achieved UL listing, FSEC certification and CEC listing for its Multisol P6-54 series of PV modules. The PV USA test conditions (PTC) rating for the Multisol P6-54 series now published by the Californian Energy Commission (CEC) is 90% of its standard test conditions (STC) nameplate rating.

Solar Power Inc., (SPI) has signed a sales representation agreement with Annerher S.L. of Barcelona, Spain to establish 'Yes! Solar Power' dealers based in Spain and Portugal. Annerher will represent the dealer program and sales of the company's 'Yes! Energy Series' residential PV solar products, integrated solutions and SPI's commercial solar solutions. Annerher will solicit dealerships throughout Spain and Portugal in order to distribute SPI's PV solar product lines.

Progress Energy Carolinas has signed a contract with Advanced Green Technologies (AGT) in which AGT will build, own and operate a 1.27MW BIPV solar array on the roof of a BSH Home Appliances warehouse in New Bern, N.C. The output will be sold to the utility for distribution to its customers.

The Swedish Presidency has been congratulated for the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD). This instruction outlines that any new European building will have to be "nearly zero energy" by the year 2020, meaning a far greater uptake in renewable energy will be seen over the coming years.

Sun Light & Power, a SunPower Premier Dealer, has won the SunPower 'Intelegant Award for Excellence' for its residential solar-electric power system installations. The company received the award for its BIPV installation of a 4.05kW SunPower solar system on the home of D'Arcy Roche, San Mateo, California.

G-Energy and the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Tsinghua University have entered into a contract with Dyesol to supply a BIPV dye solar cell (DSC) laboratory prototyping solution. The prototype solution will enable the collaboration partners to develop glass-based DSC product based on Dyesol technology and materials.

The Weinbourg Farm solar project, utilizing the Just Roof system from Suntech is one for the world's largest BIPV solar systems. The project, which was completed in 2009, spreads out over five agricultural warehouses in France.