PV Tech visits a mini-grid at a village in the heart of the North Indian plains to see how a bold mix of biomass, solar and energy storage technologies is transforming local businesses.
A number of international initiatives have helped large-scale solar gain a foothold in Africa. The question now is how the market for this segment will develop beyond these programmes and how much capacity grids will be able to support.
Tariffs in a 1GW solar auction in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh have hit INR3.48-3.55/kWh (US$0.051-0.052), which is significantly higher than bids in other recent Indian auctions for a range of reasons, including a history of PPA renegotiations.
Europe’s installed base of electrical energy storage leaped by almost 50% during 2017 but perhaps the bigger takeaway is the growing share of battery systems installed behind-the-meter, an analyst has said
Australia’s energy and environment minister has hailed the country’s accelerating residential energy storage sales as a report has emerged from Chief Scientist Dr Alan Finkel which says the “financial equation is straightforward” for adding batteries to home PV systems.
Indian solar tariffs have matched their lowest ever in the most recent 2GW auction from Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI), hitting INR2.44/kWh (US$0.036) for the first time since May 2017, and with much of the capacity expected to be set up in Rajasthan.
South African utility Eskom and German Development Bank KfW have signed a US$100 million (~R1.35 billion) loan facility that will go towards improving the transmission network to support grid integration of renewable energy projects after 27 power purchase agreements (PPAs) were signed in April.
It now makes economic sense for most corporates in India to look for a cheaper source of power, particularly through renewable energy, according to a new report from The World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD).
Hawaii’s KIUC, the top-ranked US utility in 2017 for energy storage deployment per customer by SEPA (Smart Electric Power Alliance), will pay less than US$0.11 per kWh for power from a new solar-plus-storage facility.
India’s unusual tender for 5GW of PV manufacturing capacity linked with 10GW of solar projects has been called many things, ranging from pioneering to fanciful, but the earliest stages have seen some of the global industry’s biggest names toss their hat in the ring.
