News in Brief: Santa Barbara, California, is the 30th US city to vote in a 100% renewable energy mandate, North Carolina legislators instate a competitive bidding process and leasing programme for solar PV while South Carolina's SCE&G launches the state's largest community solar programme; there's also more community solar online in Texas, and the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources releases its final guidelines for its solar incentive SMART programme.
Australia’s chief scientist Dr Alan Finkel has delivered his major energy review to the Australian government recommending various changes that will impact the solar PV sector.
The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) and the State Grid Corporation of China (SGCC) are collaborating on efforts towards the energy transition, including work on integrating high quantities of wind and solar power, interconnections and smart grids.
Following on from the successful year for solar that was 2016, the US market added 2,044MW of new capacity in Q1 2017 alone. As installations grow, prices continue to fall to new lows and utility-scale system prices dropped below US$1/Watt for the first time according to GTM Research.
Breaking up Eskom’s monopoly in South Africa’s power market is not the answer to signing the outstanding PPAs under the country’s renewable energy procurement programme, a representative from the Department of Energy (DOE) has said.
EDF ENR, a subsidiary of the EDF Group, has launched a collective self-consumption product targeting joint-ownership associations, housing associations and vertical housing, that wish to produce their own electricity.
A consortium of international chambers of commerce has advised the Vietnamese government that its draft solar PPA template is “non-bankable” and cannot attract financing for PV in Vietnam, particularly for medium and utility-scale projects, according to documents seen by PV Tech.
