Updated: Response to the European Commission’s anti-dumping investigation of solar modules and products imported into the EU from key Chinese producers was rapid and unanimous in condemnation of the action but also conciliatory in confirming their willingness to co-operate fully with the investigation.
After several years of rapid price declines for conventional crystalline silicon solar modules, CIGS (copper indium gallium selenium) thin-film technology hasn’t been immune from the ‘solar shakout,’ despite its inherent capabilities to provide high conversion efficiency and low-cost production. Solyndra, Odersun, Soltecture, Global Solar Energy, Solibro and MiaSolé are companies that pioneered CIGS adoption but have either failed or now seek new partners to continue operations.
Solon Energy announced that Anjan Turlapati, co-founder or Microsol, will be replacing Stefan Säuberlich as the company’s CEO. Säuberlich is said to be changing his focus to new tasks, but the company assured that he will remain on staff in a consultant position for the coming months.
DuPont PV Solutions and Distributed Sun announced a new collaboration that will focus on increasing the adoption of solar energy through the D-SUN Distributed Solar Network. The companies aim to promote data transparency and provide access to a comprehensive suite of analytical tools for the solar industry.
Martifer Solar, part of Portugal-based Martifer SGPS SA, has announced that it has completed the construction of a 1.5MW PV plant for in Pufesti, Vrancea County, Romania for Danish company Eurowind Energy. The plant represents the company’s first PV plant in the country.
Dow Corning, a specialist in silicon-based solar products based in the US, has named Eric Peeters as vice president of its electronic solutions business taking over from James Helwick, who has led Dow Corning’s electronics business since 2010. His appointment became effective on September 1.
With the 27th European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference and Exhibition (27th EU PVSEC) just around the corner on September 24-28, the European Photovoltaic Industry Association (EPIA) has announced a string of high level speakers for its events at this year’s conference.
According to the Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency (IREDA), the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission (JNNSM) initiative has so far commissioned 255MW of PV capacity as well as 2.5MW of CSP under batch 1 of the first phase of its programme.
According to Hellenic Transmission System Operator SA (HTSO), Greece has installed an additional 75MW of PV in July which brings its total amount of installed PV capacity in the first six months of the year to 319MW. This was a slight drop compared to last month, when statistics showed that the country installed a total of 97MW in PV capacity.
Jumping on the bandwagon, Inpex Corporation has made its first move into the solar power generation business and has announced plans to build a large-scale 2MW PV plant in Joetsu City, Niigata Prefecture, Japan. The proposed plant, called Inpex Mega Solar Joetsu, represents Inpex’s first large-scale solar power generation project.
