Chile has streaked ahead of its Latin American rivals after becoming the first country in the region to surpass 1GW of installed solar capacity and brush off its classification as an ‘emerging market’. Tom Kenning assesses the country's prospects as it looks to go even further with renewable energy deployment.
Japan's PV industry is changing fast. The feed-in tariff has brought about over 30GW of installed capacity, with large-scale solar outnumbering residential by about 10 to one. Ahead of this week's PV Expo in Tokyo, Andy Colthorpe takes a look at some of the issues expected to dominate.
By Jasmeet Khurana, associate director, consulting, Bridge to India
The World Trade Organisation (WTO) has ruled against India's local content rules for solar equipment in its dispute with the US. Jasmeet Khurana, associate director, consulting, Bridge to India explains why the Domestic Content Requirement (DCR) has always been unsustainable and what other policies should be considered to keep Indian solar manufacturers afloat.
As another big US CSP project bites the dust having previously rejected the suggestion that it should re-apply as a PV project, John Parnell explores whether CSP, especially power towers, risk becoming the Betamax of solar energy.
The forthcoming PV CellTech conference in Malaysia, 16-17 March 2016, is poised to unveil the key issues that will underpin c-Si solar cell manufacturing over the next few years.
After Japan’s solar market got off to a flying start, a combination of policy headwinds and grid constraints has made the going much tougher. But with new market segments opening up and an electricity market reform process about to get underway the prospects for the world’s second largest PV market of 2015 still look strong.
GCL Systems has claimed several important shipment and capacity metrics that would catapult the company into the top-10 manufacturer rankings for 2015. Mark Osborne takes a closer look at the figures.
December’s international climate deal in Paris offers PV a platform to become one of the world’s dominant energy sources. Now that the circus has left town, Ben Willis and John Parnell look at where the solar industry goes next to turn opportunity into reality.
There is no more doubt that PERC is becoming a mainstream technology in standard industrial solar cell production. The question arising is “what is next?”
