Off-Grid

Solar product distributor d.light has raised another US$10.5 million, bringing its total to US$40 million in four months for off-grid ventures in Africa and Asia.

The Alternative Technology Association (ATA) has installed hundreds of household solar lighting systems in 12 villages in East Timor.

Mexico's energy ministry is targeting distributed generation with new guidelines to boost small-scale solar and achieve savings. Minnesota and South Carolina break solar records in 2016 and Ikea installs Washington's largest rooftop solar array, while Duke Energy is to build its third PV facility in Florida.

The tax on solar self-consumption in the Balearic Islands of Spain has been doubled by a ministerial order, causing uproar from Spain’s PV industry association UNEF.

The India government and the US Government’s development finance institution, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), have launched a US$20 million finance initiative to fund renewable energy projects in India.

Renewable energy company Welink has announced a joint venture with Your Housing Group – claimed to be valued at £2.5 billion – which could see the development of 25,000 solar-powered homes using BIPV in the UK each year by 2022.

Driven by steep cost declines in PV equipment, solar is now almost on a par with wind energy and will soon become the cheapest form of energy in developing nations, according to the Climatescope 2016 report from Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF).

To help reach its ambitious 100% by 2045 renewables target, the Hawaiian Electric Companies (HECO) has issued a request for information (RFI) about land that could be available for future clean energy projects.

More than 16,000 Indian households across 800 remote villages will be given a solar panel, with an eight-hour battery storage backup, according to the Indian minister for power, coal, new and renewable energy and mines, Piyush Goyal.

The International Finance Corporation (IFC) and FMO, the Dutch development bank have invested a collective €14.62 million (US$15.52 million) in Mobisol, a German pay-as-you-go (PAYG) solar service company, in order to deliver renewable energy solutions to off-grid communities in East Africa.